News from the Diocese
Dispatches is a monthly update that seeks to keep you advised of news, developments, and resources that support our shared mission across the diocese.
72 kids and 26 leaders from New York to Maine gathered for a weekend at Pilgrim Pines to “Meet the Real Jesus.”
How did Jesus break through to a guy who thought he was better than everyone else (The Rich Young Ruler in Luke 18)? How did Jesus uplift a guy who others thought was worse than everyone else (the blind man in Jericho in Luke 18)? How did Jesus save a woman who thought she was worse than everyone else (Woman at the Well in John 4)? How did Jesus redeem a guy who everybody agreed that they hated (Zacchaeus in Luke 19)? Sean began and ended the retreat. Bishop Drew and I took the middle talks. Volunteers leaned in. We couldn’t have done it without them.
"For you I am a minister, but with you I am a Christian. The first is an office accepted; the second is a grace received." — St. Augustine
This spring has been a profound season of growth and celebration for the Anglican Diocese in New England. We have witnessed the Holy Spirit at work across state lines, calling forth new leaders to serve God’s people.
Dispatches is a monthly update that seeks to keep you advised of news, developments, and resources that support our shared mission across the diocese.
The Lord has been good and an excellent team has answered the call to serve in Uganda this August. We will be preparing for the mission trip by studying together, meeting and praying together, and learning about the area in which we will serve. We will also be working hard to raise money for the school and water project. The details are included below. If you would like us to visit your church to share about the upcoming trip and the mission work of the ADNE, please contact me at leah.turner@adne.org. We need all your prayers, support, and yes - funds. This is the largest project we have attempted but we know the Lord can do it. Enjoy reading about Centenery School and God Bless!
The Anglican Diocese in New England recently inaugurated its “Gospel Integration Seminar Series,” a scholarly and pastoral initiative designed to navigate the turbulent waters of our modern reality. By applying a rigorous theological lens to the most sensitive issues of our time, the series seeks to equip the Church to recover its voice—not through the frantic efforts of cultural commentary, but within the finality of God’s redemptive word.
This April we invite you to discover the heart of healing prayer and learn how to minister with confidence, compassion, and the power of the Holy Spirit at the ADNE’s Prayer Ministry Training Conference.
We begin this morning in the pre-dawn gray of a garden, walking alongside a group of women who are carrying the heaviest weight a human being can bear. Luke 24 tells us they came "very early in the morning," carrying spices they had prepared. We must understand the heartbreak of those spices; you do not bring spices to a wedding, a baptism or a birthday party—you bring them to a corpse. Those spices were the "perfume of decay." They represent the resigned acceptance that death is the final word, and that the "laws of the grave" are the only laws that truly matter.
Dispatches is a monthly update that seeks to keep you advised of news, developments, and resources that support our shared mission across the diocese.
Dispatches is a monthly update that seeks to keep you advised of news, developments, and resources that support our shared mission across the diocese.
Dispatches is a monthly update that seeks to keep you advised of news, developments, and resources that support our shared mission across the diocese.
We are building community with artists who want to use the arts to share the grace of Jesus with those outside the church. Of course, we want to bring healing and encouragement to those inside the church too. But when you aim beyond yourselves, you end up doing both!
Dispatches is a monthly update that seeks to keep you advised of news, developments, and resources that support our shared mission across the diocese.
Come join us in August of 2026 as we travel to the Diocese of Muhabura in Southwest Uganda. This will be our second multi-generational mission trip to East Africa.
Dispatches is a monthly update that seeks to keep you advised of news, developments, and resources that support our shared mission across the diocese.
Dispatches is a monthly update that seeks to keep you advised of news, developments, and resources that support our shared mission across the diocese.
The Reawakening Conference last weekend was testimony to the Unbound Gospel. We needed it. We continue to. Last weekend, the annual Reawakening Conference hosted by the Anglican Diocese of New England gathered 340 people from over 37 churches. We were entirely focused on sharing the Power of God’s Promise to save and redeem through the grace of Jesus Christ.
Twenty Soldiers from 1st Battalion, 16th Infantry Regiment, deployed to Novo Selo Training Area, joined the Municipality of Kotel and local residents Sept. 20, 2025, in support of Bulgaria’s national volunteer initiative “Let’s Clean Bulgaria Together.”
Canon Leah Turner and the Reverend Doctor Jeff Dorn embarked on a life-changing journey. This journey took them to prison, the homes and businesses of over twenty parishioners, a women’s seminar, a youth seminar, and Sunday services at ACK St. Paul’s and ACK St. Mary’s churches in the Machakos Diocese.
In February 2012, a small collection of worshippers was preparing for the launch of a new church in the Greater Bangor region of eastern/central Maine. That church would be known as Imago Dei Anglican Church. Now thirteen years later, it is receiving a new name…
Bishop Drew is chairing the ACNA Music Task Force. This month the task force convened in Charleston. The hope is to provide the province with a digital tool offering churches across the ACNA worship music resources through the lens of the Sunday lectionary week by week.
We hosted a one-day training in communication and listening skills that have greatly blessed us in our marriage and other relationships. We use them to do our pre-marriage counseling: we teach these skills to the couple and then facilitate their active listening on all the key topics. We introduce these skills in our “Better than Wine: Building and Rebuilding Intimacy” Marriage conference. Last weekend, we were hosted by our friends at Anglican Church of the Redeemer, Franklin, MA (thank you Rev. Dan and Lisa Sylvia!) We dove in with a pilot group of couples. It is our hope to bring this workshop and/or the entire marriage conference to you one day!
Early in 2024, Redeemer Franklin embarked on a year-long project to prepare for Advent, which became known as The Isaiah Project. The initiative was designed as a study of the book of Isaiah and included the development of artistic responses created by many of the artists and creators at Redeemer. From the beginning, the vision for the project was a collaborative effort that would produce music, visual arts, prose, and drama—all culminating in a mid-Advent celebration of the coming of Christmas.
Over 30 individuals contributed to the project, which developed throughout the spring and summer before blossoming into the final presentation in December. Musically, the project was spearheaded by Isaiah Sylvia, Music Director at Redeemer, along with the Redeemer band members and some guest collaborators. Together, they created a six-song EP, all self-written and composed.
The joy of Christmas.
St. Paul's Anglican Church (formerly in Waltham, and now located at 9 Westminster Avenue, Arlington, MA) celebrated Christmas in a trinity form: three congregations came together to celebrate the birth of our Lord Jesus Christ on Sunday, December 22.
Operation Sleigh Ride was formed in late 2024 as an effort to encourage families of children impacted by Hurricane Helene. To facilitate providing toys for 800 children, drop sites were set up all over the Northeast.
Saint Nicholas House, which describes itself as a house of hospitality and prayer, joined the efforts by choosing to have a community gift drop box on the front porch of their Brookline, NH house.
From the Province: Rise Church in Portland, Maine is an Anglican church merged from three congregations: what was formerly the Church of the Holy Spirit, a Sudanese church, and the newer, Rise Church. The physical church building, over 100 years old, is seeing new life breathed into it as God grows the church in unexpected ways.
See the original article from the ACNA here.
“There is nothing new under the sun”. By the time the wise Teacher in Ecclesiastes wrote this truth 3,000 years ago, so many kingdoms and dynasties had risen and fallen. Wars had been fought, work efforts had flourished and petered out, famines and plenty had come and gone. Peoples and nations lived in anxious times and in peace, in oppression and in freedom. Most had toiled under the hot sun. And the conclusion of it all? The Teacher in Ecclesiastes says “Fear God and keep his commandments.”
In the anxious times which many of us are experiencing right now, we can ”fear God” and see what happens. We can bend the knees of our hearts in reverence and adoration before the majesty of our loving God.
Can a Classical Concert Foster Encounter with the Divine, Break Down Barriers, and Plant New Seeds of God’s Kingdom?
Sarah pictured with Tiffany Fox, violin, and Jonathan McBeath, piano/organ
It was a warm summer day when I was contacted by a voice from the past: The Venerable Jerry Smith was my husband Steve’s professor and personal mentor in seminary at Trinity School for Ministry over 20 years ago and was now calling from the island country of Bermuda! He wanted to invite me to come to Bermuda to play a concert at the cathedral in the fall. I immediately said yes (who wouldn’t?) and started planning my repertoire.
As a classical musician, I am fully aware that classical music remains a niche medium in many places. It can be seen as esoteric, hard to “get into”, or just for the elite listener. For much of my professional life I have pushed hard against that, working with living composers, playing concerts in unusual venues, collaborating with dance companies or visual artists, all to try to bring what I believe can be a deeply moving experience to those who might otherwise not have the opportunity or think they “like” classical music.
Here is a selection of recommended resources from the Rev. Dr. Susie Skillen, Canon for Spiritual Formation
Bishop Drew commented, “I stand in awe of what Rev. Gabrielle and her church have done and are doing. In fervent prayer, love and humility they have played a central part in bringing the body of Christ together and in partnership with the city’s government in the activation of Jesus’ greater hope for Bridgeport. In prayer and in service they are bringing renewal. There is still much to be done - but there is undeniably beauty rising from the ashes. You can see it and feel it everywhere you look.