Diocesan News

CRECHE--the Charles River Episcopal Co-Housing Endeavor--is adding a fourth house to its stable of intentional communities, to be launched next year as Jubilee House in a new partnership with New Roots AME Church in Dorchester.

The Rev. Isaac Everett, CRECHE's executive director, announced plans for the new house at the organization's annual Pentecost gathering for friends and supporters on June 5 in the yard of CRECHE's Emmanuel House in Allston.

Bliss Austin Spooner, who served as director of development for four years, departed from the diocesan staff on June 14, having accepted a position with Hearth, Inc., a Boston nonprofit organization dedicated to ending elderly and older adult homelessness through the creation and management of affordable supportive housing.

Hymn singing and reminiscences marked the late afternoon memorial service for the Rt. Rev. Barbara Clementine Harris at the Cathedral Church of St. Paul in Boston on June 12, which would have been her 92nd birthday.

About 1,000 viewers watched the service via livestream, and churches in Brockton, Cambridge, Salem and Weston also hosted gatherings simultaneously as a way to extend participation in the service.

Harris died on March 13, 2020, just as the COVID-19 pandemic hit. Initial plans for a churchwide memorial service at Washington National Cathedral were paused and have not advanced, but the recent local easing of public gathering restrictions opened a window of opportunity for a diocesan liturgy to mourn the loss and celebrate the life of Harris--a civil rights and social justice activist and a pioneering disciple of Jesus.

Margaret Lias has been hired as assistant for congregations and grants administration, a new full-time position on the diocesan staff, and will begin on May 31.

The Office of the Bishop has issued the following notice. Updated May 6, 2022:  The funeral for the Rev. Helen Moore, originally planned for Jan. 8, 2022, will now take place at Trinity Church, Boston on Saturday, May 21 at 10 a.m.  Clergy are invited to vest (white stoles).  Masks are required; early arrival is advised. 

The Rev. Dr. Yolanda A. Rolle has been named to serve as missioner for youth and young adults and will begin her new position on the diocesan staff on Aug. 1.

Starting at sunset--7:41 p.m.--on Thursday, April 28, the diocesan Young Adult Advisory Committee and the Episcopal Chaplaincy at Harvard are teaming up to co-host a spring revival in the chaplaincy’s backyard at 2 Garden Street in Cambridge, with music by the Appalachian string band, The Onlies, smoked meats and homemade pies, and the chance to meet new people. 

“We’re looking to create spaces where young Episcopalians can find one another and build relationships and lessen both the isolation of the pandemic and also the isolation, sometimes, of being one of only a few people in our age group in many of our parishes,” the Rev. Isaac Martinez, a member of the Young Adult Advisory Committee, said in a Zoom interview.