The Diocese of Easton, which a decade ago was contemplating a merger with one of its neighboring dioceses (Maryland, Delaware, or Southern Virginia), now understands itself as a resurrected small diocese and an example of growth within the Episcopal Church.

This renewal is the direct result of Parousia, an initiative aimed at helping the diocese regain its vitality. The diocese’s convention approved ten discernment resolutions in 2015 under the guidance of Bishop Provisional Henry N. Parsley. The conventions of 2019 and 2020 affirmed a 32-page document, “Parousia: God Vision for God’s Church on the Eastern Shore of Maryland.”

“Parousia is based on needs identified by the diocese before, during, and after Bishop Marray’s installation as our 11th bishop,” said the Rev. Charlotte Meyer, a deacon and chair of the Diocesan Fund for Church Initiatives. “This document was written by Bishop Marray as an answer to the needs he encountered.”

The Rt. Rev. Santosh Marray became Bishop of Easton in 2016.

John C. Dragone, lay canon to the ordinary, calls the initiative “a blueprint on how to face short- and long-term challenges in the diocese.”

The diocese celebrated Parousia’s success during its convention on March 7-9. “I wish to inform convention that without a doubt both the ten resolutions and Parousia have fulfilled what they were designed to do, which was to give new impetus, renewed hope, energy, revitalization, and resurrection to a historic story,” Marray said in his address.

Parousia is financially sustainable partially because of the sale of St. Stephen’s Church in East New Market, which helped create the Fund for Church Initiatives. The fund is open to all the parishes of the diocese, helping to lift financial pressure and to allow congregations to live by the incarnational aspects of ministry.

Easton’s clergy shortage is now a surplus, thanks in part to partnering with Seminary of the Southwest’s Iona Collaborative. Marray said in his address that he will have ordained 19 people from 2020 to the end of 2024. The diocese also established a Bishop’s Institute for ministry training and formation. Since its launch in 2019, the institute has trained 200 lay leaders.

The diocese has bolstered its work in Latino ministry. Dr. Mark Hansen, lay pastor of St. Clement’s and diocesan missioner for Latino Ministry, and the Rev. Dr. Thomas G. Sinnott have been instrumental in this imperative. Hansen said that his “current diocesan employment is a direct consequence of the Parousia initiative,” and he is pleased by the work being done around Easton, including the training of Latino lay leadership and bilingual ministries at St. Clement’s in Massey. The diocese complemented this home-grown training by sponsoring participants’ attendance at a biennial conference at Kanuga this June, according to Hansen.

Convention included an account by Sinnott about a mission congregation, originally started in 1997 as a “joint outreach effort of Shrewsbury Parish Church, Kennedyville, and St. Andrew’s Episcopal Church in Sudlersville.” After years of development work, with Sinnott in the lead as vicar since 2004, La Sagrada Familia de Jesús “was formally accepted into the diocese at annual convention in Cambridge, Maryland, on March 3, 2019.” Sinnott envisions continued growth and challenges, noting that plans are being made for the next priest, one who’s “younger and mission-minded” to take over when he retires.

John Dragone believes that Parousia succeeded because goals that seemed difficult were “accessible if we put the work into meeting the challenges. The response by parishes and individuals across the diocese in stepping up to work through the challenges and share lessons learned throughout the process was inspiring.”

The Rev. Darcy Williams, priest in charge of Augustine Parish in Chesapeake City, one of the Parousia team leaders, says the diocese has become “a smaller but more responsive church,” and that “small parishes that seemed to be on the verge of closing have found new life, energy, and stability.”

“We want to be able to grow with Denton,” said the Rev. Paul Nesta, St. David’s rector since 2018. “We are located in one of the fastest-growing counties in America for the last 10 to 12 years.

“Our capacity to welcome new people has been limited for decades,” he said. Since the building opened in August, Nesta added, “We are already seeing a bump in attendance. There’s lots of curiosity, new people coming and sticking around.”

The Gothic-style building, designed by HH Architects of Richardson, Texas, cost $5 million, most of which has already been raised by two capital campaigns and a grant from the Diocese of Dallas.

Since construction began in June 2022, parishioners made additional gifts for pews, a lectern and pulpit, and other fittings for the new space. The woodwork, in a traditional style, was designed by John Gascho of The Bethany Group in Denton.

St. David’s former 1950s church building, which lacked side aisles and seated only about 100 people, remains in use for weekday services.

Founded in 1951, the congregation set up a long-range planning committee in 1959, which quickly determined that more space would be needed. For decades, the church has hovered around 200 in average Sunday attendance.

“We were never really able to grow,” Nesta said. “We were too large for the building we had and too small to adequately build a larger building.”

In the last several years of the tenure of Nesta’s predecessor, the Rev. H.W. (Sandy) Herrmann, St. David’s saw an influx of new families, and conversation began again about a new building. When Nesta arrived in 2018, a capital campaign was already being planned.

The initial campaign met its goal of $2.3 million, but tariff-escalated steel prices, followed by a steep rise in all construction costs after COVID, led to several plan revisions and a second appeal for funds. Altogether, the parish raised close to $4.5 million for the project.

“It wasn’t the best time for a construction project,” Nesta mused. “Things got pretty crazy for a while.” He said the congregation was very grateful for the flexibility and insight of RJM Contractors of Fort Worth, a business owned by R.J. Miller, a fellow Episcopalian.

The service of consecration was led by the Rt. Rev. George Sumner, Bishop of Dallas. It included an anthem commissioned from English composer Bob Chilcott, a setting of George Herbert’s “The Church-floore.”

In his sermon at the service, Nesta spoke of his gratitude for those who built up the congregation in past decades: “We are here by their labor, their generosity, and their faithfulness. We aren’t here today because a building was consecrated. We’re here because a people were consecrated and given good work to advance.”

“This is a chance for us to rise up and say, ‘Now it’s our turn, to serve people who will be here in 70 years’ time’” Nesta told TLC.  “We’re excited about the people who will be worshiping Jesus in the Episcopal way 70 years from now because of our prayerful, humble, efforts today.”

Dropkick me, Jesus, through the goalposts of life
End over end, neither left nor the right
Straight through the heart of them righteous uprights
Dropkick me, Jesus, through the goalposts of life

College football player and Episcopalian Emory Duggar also combines faith and football, and doesn’t mind a joke or two about the mix.

Duggar set up plenty of dropkicks as a long snapper for the University of Kansas (KU) Jayhawks from 2020 to 2024, and has since moved to Louisiana State University in his hometown of Baton Rouge.

“I wasn’t always a long snapper,” Duggar said. “I started out as a kicker, but one day in high school, our old long snapper made a bad snap, and I made a good one, and I guess the rest is history.”

What began by chance has turned into a sort of providence. “Over the years, I have really fallen in love with being a long snapper — it fits my personality really well.” Duggar noted that the long snapper, whose job is to pass the ball backward from the line of scrimmage over long distances — most often to a kicker — isn’t usually king of the campus. But his job is just as important as anyone else’s.

“A team’s long snapper is pretty incognito, under the radar,” he said. “I sort of consider it a service position. During practice, if a kicker or a punter wants a snap, it’s my job to give them what they need. Really, my job is to make other players’ jobs easier.”

Duggar says the intensity of the game can get to him. “Six inches here is the difference between a shank or field flicker,” he said. “When everything goes right, and you do really well, there is almost nothing like standing in the middle of the field, 50,000 people staring down, as proud as they could be. But if you have enough bad games, you could really come to hate yourself.” Duggar says that is when his faith comes into play.

“Salvation comes through grace, not touchdowns, we all know this,” Duggar said. “That is why my first identity is not a football player, but a Christian. It is not lost on me that I am in an incredibly privileged position; here I am still playing football when most people have to quit at 18.”

Duggar maintains that his faith enhances his playing and his life in Christ. “With my identity in Christ, it is easier to remember that football is just a game, and that I should try, more than anything, to just enjoy the play,” he said. “Also, placing my identity in Christ helps me stay humble, something important when you regularly perform in front of tens of thousands of screaming fans. … I often am reminded of Matthew 23: ‘But those who exalt themselves will be humbled.’”

Off the field, Duggar is just as invested in nurturing his faith as he is in letting it guide his mindset on the field. “Basically, having faith as a student athlete keeps you humble and hungry in an athletic sense and humble and healthy in a religious sense,” he said.

Duggar hosted a weekly team Bible study at his house during his KU years. “Sort of a KU football tradition at this point, the group gets handed down from year to year, which I think is great.” Duggar said that the main objective of the group is to allow guys to grow closer to God and disclose their interior lives. “The second goal is more important than you might think, especially in a culture where people think football players are these silent kind of guys, or who have nothing to share in the first place.”

Duggar is quick to say that faith of all sorts is an important part of life on the team. “On Friday nights we always have a devotional before the next day’s game. We also have a tradition of praying after practice — of course that can be a little awkward if you don’t know it’s your turn to pray.”

Darrell Stuckey, a former KU Jayhawk and a former safety for the San Diego Chargers, offers the team spiritual oversight. “Darrell is great member of the community — he often helps lead devotionals and is always checking in on how the Bible study is going,” Duggar said.

While playing for KU, Duggar regularly attended St. Margaret’s Episcopal Church in Lawrence, Kansas. “It all works out great because I can be at Communion at 10 and still have time to get to Sunday workouts by 11,” he said. “Prioritizing Sunday morning is also helpful because it changes what you do after games — let’s just say going to church pays spiritual and physical dividends.”

When Duggar first came to KU, he was not attending church regularly. Then he began attending a couple of nondenominational churches with teammates. “Eventually you start to miss the liturgy,” he said. “Liturgy has this way of imprinting itself on you. That’s when I started attending the Episcopal Church again.”

As Duggar grew up in Baton Rouge, he attended St. Luke’s Episcopal Church with his family. “My mom grew up Methodist and my dad Baptist,” he said. “If you didn’t already know, in the South, that means something. It wasn’t until my sister started attending an Episcopal school that we would go to the church to see her sing. Eventually we all fell in love with the church, I got confirmed, and even after moving across town, we all kept attending.”

Duggar has one message: keep the faith. “Recruiters will make playing football sound amazing, which most of the time it is, but be prepared for the lows and how you are going to confront them,” he said. “If you keep your values, you will play in a more authentic way. I wouldn’t be the player I am today without my faith. Remember, first and foremost, be yourself, be a Christian.”

This massive, cost-lowering shift is having far-reaching ripple effects on congregational leadership, including who practices it, how leaders train, and what forms leadership takes.

“This is really of earthquake proportions,” said the Rev. Canon Doris Westfall, Canon to the Ordinary in the Diocese of Missouri. “That’s part of what anxiety is coming through. The earth is shifting underneath our feet, and we don’t know where we’re going to land. We don’t know what’s going to shake out, what’s going to collapse, and what’s going to survive.”

It’s an unnerving time, yet amid this shakeup, new spiritual fruit is growing. Transition officers, who support congregations in search of clergy and clergy in search of new positions, are seeing models emerge that strengthen capacities among all types of believers.

“Many of our congregations we would consider lay-led and clergy-supported,” said the Rev. Canon Liz Easton, Canon to the Ordinary in the Diocese of Nebraska. “The lay leadership in those congregations is so mature and authentic that there is sort of an innate understanding of roles. There’s not an expectation that the priest comes in and does everything.”

Such models are providing hope in the many regions where priests are scarce. Contributing factors include low levels of interest in vacant clergy positions of various types, especially the part-time roles that comprise the majority of listings churchwide. For every cleric in search of a new position, approximately eight vacancies await, according to data from the Office for Transition Ministry.

Concurrent trends are powering the tectonic shift. For congregations, declining worship attendance and rising maintenance costs have squeezed budgets, resulting in part-time salaries instead of full-time packages. For priests, relocating can become less attractive, partly because in these times of rapid change, many find security where their spouses or partners already have stable employment and where they have networks of friends, family, and supportive cultural environments, said the Rev. Meghan Froehlich, director of the Office for Transition Ministry.

“In some areas, political and cultural violence is on the rise,” Froehlich said. “It may or may not be a safe idea for either a clergyperson or a member of their household to be in a particular location. The political context over many years has increasingly affected people’s ability to serve in a particular place.”

Challenges notwithstanding, congregations are adapting to the lack of mobile priests by mobilizing more of the baptized for ministry. They’re also drawing on relationships with the wider church to share priests and provide local training for new leaders to rise, according to transition ministry officers.

These adaptations are bringing spiritual gifts from more parts of the body of Christ, observers say, and fostering vitality in settings where it wasn’t necessarily expected.

Consider what’s happening in the hills of Southwestern Virginia. Four congregations — St. Mark’s in St. Paul, All Saints in Norton, Christ Church in Big Stone Gap and Stras Memorial in Tazewell — were out of options five years ago. None could afford a full-time priest. And recruiting part-timers to small, rural settings in Appalachia can take a long time, said the Rev. Canon John Harris, canon to the ordinary in the Diocese of Southwestern Virginia.

“A key aspect has been when a lot of these places realize they need to do something. Otherwise, they’re not going to exist,” Harris said. “Then they’re more open to ideas. A lot in the Appalachian region have realized they had to be open to an experiment.”

The four congregations responded by creating the Appalachian Alliance, which involves sharing one priest as well as teaming up for mission projects, programs, and occasional joint worship services. Last year, Christ Church in Big Stone Gap withdrew from the Alliance; another congregation, Christ Church in Marion, took its place.

Each contributes 25 percent of what’s needed to fund a full-time equivalent position for the Rev. John Church. He celebrates Eucharist twice every Sunday — once in the morning and once at 5 p.m. — which allows him to visit each of his four congregations every two weeks. On Sundays when he’s elsewhere in the Alliance, parishioners gather for lay-led Morning Prayer.

The partnership has energized the congregations, Church said. The three original member congregations have grown average worship attendance by more than 20 percent since the alliance was formed four years ago. As more lay leaders fill gaps, Church sees them becoming confident witnesses and evangelists in their communities.

Vesting laypeople with leadership roles “encourages the growth quicker,” Church said. “I’m not saying they wouldn’t develop those same skills if I were there all the time. But I think the added pressure of me not being there twice a month increases their ability to see what is possible and follow in the Spirit.”

Priest-sharing among congregations is also reinforcing habits of catholicity. In the Diocese of West Missouri, for instance, priest-sharing is the norm even for the largest congregations, such as St. Andrew’s in Kansas City. That’s because those with multiple priests on staff believe it’s part of their mission to provide “clergy care” for those who have none, said the Rev. Chas Marks, missioner for transitions.

Almost every Sunday, a priest from St. Andrew’s makes the 112-mile round trip drive to celebrate Eucharist at Christ Church in Lexington, Missouri. When no priest is available, a St. Andrew’s deacon brings the reserved sacrament to Christ Church.

“That’s something they do on their own,” Marks said. “It’s just become part of their ministry of giving back to the diocese. We’ve really been trying to live into this idea of the diocese being the church of the whole. … What’s good for Lexington is good for Kansas City and vice versa.”

Now that most clergy positions are part time, vocations still happen but the approach is changing. Many future priests are agreeing to local, video-based training if it means they can keep their homes, learn in local cohorts with in-person peers, and maintain much of what already fills their lives.

One indicator is the popularity of cost-effective, local training programs. For example, the number of dioceses that are members of the Iona Collaborative has soared from 11 in 2017 to 35 today. Most have organized diocesan schools to work with video-based curricula from the Seminary of the Southwest, which runs the collaborative.

Such schools are educating not only bivocational priests but also deacons and laypeople. For the first time this year, most continuing education offered through the collaborative is order-neutral. That means people from all three orders can sign up for a course and study in cohorts alongside people from other orders. Now a layperson might be studying preaching or pastoral care alongside an Iona-trained priest and discussing what authentic, Christlike witness looks like for both.

“For small church leaders, having a community of peers that’s in mixed orders is really healthy,” said Nandra Perry, director of the Iona Collaborative. “They understand their roles really well when they are out in ministry together. They work together with a lot of respect and synergy. We consider that, pedagogically, actually a value.”

Not all that’s emerging on today’s shifting landscape speaks of spiritual fruitfulness. In Southwestern Virginia, for instance, congregations that can’t afford full-time priests are encouraged to share priests so that a cleric can receive full-time equivalent compensation. But even those arrangements can be a hard sell.

“There are not that many clergy who are willing to work part time or even do a sharing relationship” that adds up to a full-time equivalent, Harris said. “Some are [willing]. But I think a lot of priests, if they want a full-time job, would rather just have one church.” One reason: they fear that in a two-point charge, they will end up doing double the administrative work, such as attending two vestry meetings rather than one, and therefore carry more of the profession’s burdensome aspects.

As challenges get sorted out, the great adaption continues — as does the joyful work of keeping alert for new spiritual bounty. In Nebraska, whenever Canon Easton visits a congregation, she looks for a particularly engaged child, pulls that child aside and says, “I think you’d make a great priest.”

“One of the delights of this transition in ordained ministry right now comes when that child says to me: ‘I do love church and I would like to be a priest, but I really want to be a pilot,’ as kids do,” Easton said. “I can say to them: ‘Oh my gosh, you can be a pilot and a priest! Just look at Mother So-and-So over there. She’s a this and also a that.’ So there is an imagination in how we understand priestly ministry that’s going to change and will just continue to evolve. As it always has.”

This year a few common threads could not escape my notice: focus on children’s and youth formation; care for the land; landmark anniversaries, adjusting to change, and recovering from tragedy; and support for foster care and family support services. The thread that stands out to me most is the sheer (and sobering) number of Partners who have felt a call to meet acute and growing needs for food and shelter in their communities.

These are stories of fundraisers, children’s choirs, church fires, parish picnics, and bats in the nave. They are also stories of communities in need, and longing for God’s love. I am grateful for these stories, and pray that “he who began a good work in you might complete it until the day of Jesus Christ” (Phil. 1:6).

If your parish, diocese, or organization would like to explore becoming a Living Church Partner, please write our executive director, the Rev. Dr. Matthew S.C. Olver, at matthew.olver@livingchurch.org.

Amber Noel
Director of Programs