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Welcome

Welcome to St. Alban’s Church! Every Sunday, and most days in between, people gather in this place to worship, to learn, to grow, to share the joys and struggles of our lives, and to seek God’s grace in the midst of our lives. We do not come because we have it all figured out, but because we are seeking light on the way. We come as we are and welcome one another.

On this website, you can find information about our worship, our classes for people of all ages, membership at St. Alban's, and about how we seek to make a difference in this world. We warmly encourage you to join us for a Sunday service or for some of the many other events that happen here. You belong at St. Alban’s.

Please fill out this welcome form to connect with us.

Contact us with any questions. Call (202) 363-8286 or email the church office.

 

Service Times 

Weekly In-person Sunday Service Schedule (Please note: Service times may be changed during the seasons of Christmas and Lent and during the summer. Please refer to our calendar to confirm the times.):

8 a.m. (English) in the Church
9 a.m. (English) in the Church
11:15 a.m. (English) in the Church
11:15 a.m. (Spanish) in Nourse Hall (same building as the Church)

Communion in one kind (i.e. wafers) will be offered at the main altar, although we will happily bring communion to those for whom steps are challenging. 

Weekly Live Sunday Services are live-streamed on our Youtube channel (St. Alban's DC) at 9 a.m. every Sunday, as is our Spanish service at 11:15 a.m. 

Evening Prayer Thursdays, 5:30 p.m. via Zoom, join us for a time of reflection and sharing at the close of your busy day. Contact Paul Brewster for the link. 

 

Directions

St. Alban’s Episcopal Church is located next to the Washington National Cathedral at the corner of Massachusetts and Wisconsin Avenues in the northwest section of the District of Columbia.

From either direction on the north loop of the Capital Beltway/I-495 follow signs for Route 355/Wisconsin Ave south toward DC. St. Alban’s is located on the left just before the intersection of Massachusetts and Wisconsin Avenues NW. Make a left onto Lych Gate Rd before you reach Massachusetts Ave. As you enter the drive, the church will be on your left and Satterlee Hall and the Rectory on the right. Stay on Lych Gate until it becomes Pilgrim Rd.

From any Virginia main in-bound thoroughfare (George Washington Memorial Parkway, I-395, Route 50, I-66), follow signs to Rosslyn and take the Key Bridge from Rosslyn north across the Potomac River into Georgetown. Go right on M St, left on Wisconsin Ave. St. Alban’s is located on the right just after the intersection of Massachusetts and Wisconsin Avenues NW. Make a right onto Lych Gate Rd after passing Massachusetts. As you enter the drive, the church will be on your left and Satterlee Hall and the Rectory on the right. Stay on Lych Gate until it becomes Pilgrim Rd.

Parking is available on Pilgrim Road Monday-Friday after 3:30 pm and all day Saturday and Sunday. Parking is also available in the Cathedral’s underground garage for a fee Monday- Saturday and for free on Sunday.  You may also park on neighborhood streets according to DC parking signs.

What to Expect

Visiting a church for the first time can be a bit daunting. So we have tried to put together the answers to some of the questions you’re likely to have and to ensure that you find a warm welcome here. Click on the questions to learn more.)

How do you worship?

What time are services on Sunday morning?

How long do services last?

Where can I park?

Do you offer programs for children?

What should I wear?

Do you have provisions for the differently-abled?

For Your Kids

Children’s Ministry

At St. Alban’s, we believe that a child’s spiritual growth is just as important as their physical and intellectual growth. Our goal is to help children name and value the presence and love of God in their lives. We do this through a variety of means – by providing stable and consistent adult mentors, encouraging strong peer relationships, and supporting parents in their families’ faith lives at home.

Worship: This Fall, Children's Chapel meets during the first half of the 9:00 a.m. service in Nourse Hall (a spacious parish hall in the same building as the main worship space.) Kids and families join "big church" at the Peace so everyone can receive Communion together. To learn more, contact the Rev’d Emily Griffin.

Education: We've resumed our formation programs for the 2022-2023 period. Here’s everything you need to know:

  • Sunday School and Youth Group Classes are from 10:15 to 11:05 a.m.
  • Nursery, 2s & 3s, PreK to 1st Grade, 2nd to 3rd Grade, and 4th to 6th Grade all meet upstairs in Satterlee Hall. Youth classes meet downstairs in Satterlee Hall.
  • If you haven’t registered your child or teen yet, it’s not too late. Register in person at the start of class or click here

Questions? For children, contact the Rev’d Emily Griffin at . For youth, contact the Rev’d Yoimel González Hernández at .

Learn more about Children's Ministries
Youth Ministry

Four teen groups participate in formation classes at St. Alban’s on Sunday mornings. We use the nationally recognized Episcopal curriculum “Journey to Adulthood," or J2A. J2A has two guiding principles: 1) Manhood and womanhood are gifts of God; and 2) Adulthood must be earned. This is a strong program with over 50 youth participating, many of whom engage in a wide variety of ministries at St. Alban’s. Two or three adults mentor each of the groups for two years, sharing their own faith journeys and forming strong bonds of fellowship with the participants.Learn more about Youth Ministries

The Episcopal Church

As Episcopalians, we follow Jesus Christ as our Lord and Savior. We believe in the Father, Son and Holy Spirit. We believe God is active in our everyday lives through the power of the Holy Spirit.  

The mission of the Church is to restore all people to unity with God and with each other in Christ. The Church pursues its mission as it prays and worships, proclaims the gospel, and promotes justice, peace and love. The Church carries out its mission through the ministry of all of its members.

We uphold the Bible and worship with the Book of Common Prayer. We believe the Holy Scriptures are the revealed Word of God. In worship we unite ourselves with one another to acknowledge the holiness of God, to hear God's Word, to offer prayer and praise, and to celebrate the Sacraments. The Celebration of Holy Eucharist is the central act of worship in accordance with Jesus' command to His disciples. Holy Communion may be received by all baptized Christians, not only members of the Episcopal Church.

The Episcopal Church is part of the worldwide Anglican Communion with 70 million members in 165 countries.  The word "Episcopal" refers to government by bishops. The historic episcopate continues the work of the first apostles in the Church, guarding the faith, unity and discipline of the Church. Both men and women, including those who are married, are eligible for ordination as deacons, priests and bishops. 

We strive to love our neighbors as ourselves and respect the dignity of every person. We welcome all to find a spiritual home in the Episcopal Church.

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Jesus before the Council/Peter’s Denial

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03.30.18

Jesus before the Council/Peter’s Denial

Jesus before the Council/Peter’s Denial

Series: Holy Week

Speaker: The Rev'd Emily Griffin

He wasn’t the first to feel this way. I’m not sure if it’s comforting or horrifying to have your experience mirrored back to you in Psalm 69. Who wants to be a member of this club? “Zeal for your house has eaten me up; the scorn of those who scorn you has fallen upon me…I looked for sympathy, but there was none, for comforters, but I could find none…” Everything we imagine Jesus feeling at this sham of a trial – everything we can’t quite picture inside the heart of God - is articulated here by someone centuries before who unfortunately knew the territory – the shame and isolation, the anger and frustration of being misrepresented so thoroughly, the blinding disorientation of being the object of another’s hate and lies, the fear that this disgrace will bring others shame, that the seeds planted won’t survive this storm. We have to imagine some of these feelings on Jesus’ part, of course; Mark doesn’t feel the need to convey them all. He doesn’t presume to know what exactly Jesus is feeling; for the most part, he lets Jesus’ words, his actions, his silences speak instead.

Besides, Jesus already had his “save me” moment back in the garden. We’re told he was distressed and agitated, that he asked for this cup to be removed from him. By the time we hit this mad house though, he’s got his poker face on again. We don’t see the waters rising to his neck, the firm ground slipping from beneath his feet. But he has to wonder what will be left standing when this is all over. His family thinks he’s crazy, his friends have deserted him; at this very moment, his second-in-command is treating him like he’s radioactive. True, he predicted all this would happen. He told the disciples three times that he’d be rejected by the religious leaders, that he’d be mocked and condemned to death by them. He knew that Peter’s bravado and bluster were just that – that his bold words were masking deeper fears and that he’d sink under the first strong wave. But who wants to be right about that? At the moment, being right about the frailty and baseness of his fellow human beings must feel like pretty cold comfort.

There’s a little too much humanity on display here, too much we’d prefer not to have mirrored back to us. It’s easy to turn the chief priests and elders here into cardboard villains, but to be honest - we’re not sure we want a God who’d expose us to this kind of vulnerability either. If the Messiah, the Son of the Blessed One, could be treated like this, what does that say about who’s protecting us? If it’s possible to control our exposure to the pain of life, if we can reduce the risks to body, mind and soul by conducting the right rituals in the right places with the right people, then isn’t it worth it to try? If only we could measure our holiness – our usefulness to God – by the behaviors that separate us from others instead of by the humanity that unites us.

We tend to think that the religious leaders of Jesus’ day misunderstood him, that if they’d only paid greater attention they would have treated him differently. I’m not sure that’s the case. Jesus called us all to a love that, by definition, includes the capacity to suffer. It’s what the word compassion means – to suffer with. He relentlessly exposed our attempts to distance ourselves from our suffering brothers and sisters, our drive to isolate the sick, the poor, and the condemned. He said that he came for sinners, not the already righteous; he collapsed any distance between us and them – whoever “us” and “them” may be. If there was any way the religious leaders could protect themselves from this frightening reality, if there was any way they could prove him wrong, that’s exactly what they were going to do.

They couldn’t, of course. Once again, he was right. The storms of life will come for us whether we’re ready for them or not; no amount of institutionally-defined holiness makes us flood-proof. In fact, standing alongside the suffering and acting on our God-given compassion will increase our risks. Bidden or unbidden, we’ll all find times when it seems like the deep water will overtake us, that we’re alone in our pain and shame and that the darkness will last forever. It’s today of all days, on Good Friday, when we realize that the Messiah, the Son of the Blessed One is standing right next to us – in our anger and frustration, our disorientation and fear. We’re not the first to feel this way; no matter what kind of pain we’re facing, we’re not facing it alone. We don’t have to pretend that our lives are any less messy than they are; we don’t need to waste our time with self-justification or self-pity; we don’t need to spend any more energy separating ourselves from our fellow sufferers, grading our suffering against theirs. We can let the compassionate heart of Jesus touch and eventually transform it all.

After all, he’s been right so far. If he was right about our weakness and brokenness, right about the costs of love and value of compassion, then maybe he’s right about the rest of it – right about seeds that eventually find their way to good soil no matter how many birds or stones or thorns may get in the way, right about new life emerging out of death and darkness, right about seeing him on the road ahead of us, and right that we haven’t reached the end of our story and that the end is still to come.