This is my search section here
  • Welcome
  • Service Times
  • Directions
  • What to Expect
  • For Your Kids
  • The Episcopal Church
Close X

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.

I'm New
St. Alban's
Header Image

Picking Up the Call

Filter By:
02.28.16

Picking Up the Call

Picking Up the Call

Series: Lent

Speaker: The Rev'd Emily Griffin

Sermon – Picking Up the Call
The Rev. Emily Griffin – 2/28/16
Exodus 3:1-15, I Corinthians 10:1-13, Luke 13:1-9 

I thought it was Jesus we were following – into the wilderness, that is. Isn’t that what the season of Lent is all about – reducing distractions and facing our demons honestly as Jesus did in his 40 days in the wilderness? I’m afraid we missed a signal somehow. You see, in clock time, by today’s Gospel reading, Jesus has already moved on from the wilderness. He’s not there anymore. He’s set his face toward Jerusalem. He knows where he’s going. The problem is - I’m not sure we’ve caught up with him just yet. It’s not entirely our fault; it is an election year on the eve of Super Tuesday. It’s understandable to feel a little lost. Many of us aren’t done with our wandering in the wilderness, not by a long shot; we’re not sure yet where we’re going - as individuals, as a community, or as a nation - much less how we’ll get there.

Fortunately, our Old Testament reading from Exodus lets us linger in the wild a little bit longer. We can use the make-up time, I think. Only our companion this time isn’t Jesus. It’s Moses. Let’s see if he can help us get our bearings. Our translation says Moses went beyond the wilderness to Horeb, the mountain of God. But he hasn’t really left the wilderness. He doesn’t know where he is (not really) or where he’s going; that sounds like wilderness to me. At this point, the only person who knows this is the “mountain of God” is the narrator. Moses doesn’t know yet that this is holy ground, that all ground might actually be holy because God is already here. (In that light, it’s a wonder we ever wear shoes. But I digress.) For Moses, his new life begins as just another work day at the base of an unmarked mountain tending his father-in-law’s sheep. He’s not looking for God when God finds him. Thank God it works that way sometimes.

In a way, this is Moses’ second life, his second try at being an adult. His starter life was in Egypt under the care of Pharaoh’s daughter, the one who drew him out of the Nile and adopted him. Remember Moses, the baby in the bulrushes? Well, by the time we meet him today, he’s all grown up. We aren’t told when exactly he figured out that he was Hebrew (and not Egyptian like the Pharaoh), that his relatives weren’t royalty after all, but slaves. Talk about an identity crisis. What did he do to grow up in luxury while his people were in poverty and chains? In a youthful attempt at solidarity, he ends up killing an Egyptian who was beating a fellow Hebrew. Naively, he thought he’d be praised for defending his own; but all he ends up doing is scaring the slaves and enraging the Pharaoh. The Moses we meet this morning is not a hero, at least not yet. He’s a fugitive on the run.

He’s made a new life for himself in Midian, sure – like many of us who’ve tried to make a new start in a new place. He’s gotten married, had a kid, settled into a career as a shepherd. It’s not a bad life. If he stays in this new land long enough, maybe he’ll be forgotten back home. It’s not redemption, but who is he to expect that? Maybe if he’d made better, less foolish choices when he was younger, there’d still be time to do great things for God, great things in the world. But it’s too late for that, right? If the past can’t be repeated, perhaps the most we can hope for is that it will be mercifully buried and forgotten.  I mean - how else do we move on?

No wonder he doesn’t feel like picking up God’s call to go back home. He tried playing Savior once before, and look where that got him. So what if the old Pharaoh is dead now? The statute of limitations may have passed on his crime, but he still knows what he did. It’s not false modesty that leads him to ask, “Who am I that I should go to Pharaoh and bring the Israelites out of Egypt?” The LORD’s response is either comforting or infuriating, depending on your perspective. God does not answer the question with a reassuring list of redeeming qualities or marketable skills. It’s simply this: “I will be with you.” Apparently, that’s enough.

This passage from Exodus is the beginning of what’s known as the call of Moses. What we have here is just the start of Moses’ argument with God. He asks God a lot of questions. It’s good to know we can do that. Who am I to do this? Come to think of it, who are you, God, to ask? What if they don’t believe me? He protests even. I’m not good at public speaking. I can’t think on my feet. Finally he pleads: Please…(and I quote) “send someone else.” Perhaps our identification with Moses is never as strong as at this moment.

Those of us who have ever felt tapped, nudged, prodded by God (or some unseen force) to do something big, something costly for somebody else; we know what this feels like. Maybe it’s a new job or role that expands our influence – that makes us more visible and open to criticism that gives us pause. Or maybe, as with Moses, it’s a call to move closer to home, closer to our families and their messy needs, that scares the living daylights out of us. Or perhaps it has nothing to do with a move. Maybe it’s a call to stay put and take some responsibility for the needs of our own communities that frightens us.

Like Moses, we might not know how to reconcile our privilege with our neighbor’s poverty. We don’t want to say or do the wrong thing and inadvertently make things worse. Perhaps we weren’t looking for God when God found us and opened that new door, when we saw another person’s suffering and were asked to respond. Not just with our prayers, but with our resources – or perhaps even more valuable, our time. Perhaps we tried playing Savior before, and we fell flat on our faces. Maybe we lost the distinction between our needs and theirs and made it more about us than them. It happens. Or maybe we tried to help and got had. That happens too. We don’t want to do any of that again. So what can we learn from Moses and his wilderness story that might give us some direction in ours as we discern our calls to serve?

Well, it’s worth noting that we don’t necessarily need to be in the “right” place and the “right” time in our lives to hear God’s call. I’m not sure there is one “right” place or “right” time. We can get the holy nudge here in church, sure, but it might just as easily happen at work or home or where we volunteer. It might happen while we’re reading or watching the news, or it might not feel like a watershed “moment” at all. It may dawn gradually after months, even years of discernment. And it probably will change over time. Sometimes we outgrow the pot in which we’re planted. The truth is, there is no ground, no time that cannot be made holy – once we have the eyes and ears to notice the God who’s already here. We might not get a burning bush. In fact, we probably won’t - even when such a sign might be really helpful. But an encounter with God doesn’t need to be exotic or even extraordinary to be real.

What about our past, though – all those things we wish could be mercifully forgotten, erased from the cosmic internet for good? What if our shame doesn’t automatically disqualify us from doing something great in the world for God? We cannot undo what we’ve done; that’s true. But we can learn something from our mistakes and failures and bring what we’ve learned to the next situation – whether that lesson is humility or compassion or simply an awareness that God’s not finished with any of us yet. Who knows? Maybe that’s part of what redemption looks like. There can be more than one way to move on.

So what does all this Moses talk have to do with Lent, with our life at St. Alban’s and in our world now? I thought it was Jesus we were following. Don’t worry – it still is. We haven’t wandered that far from the pack. In fact, something we’re doing in just a few moments might help us as we find our bearings again. Very shortly, we will be commissioning the newest members of the Board of the WSA – the Workers of St. Alban’s. For those of you who aren’t familiar with the WSA, this is the group of people who take the funds raised from our Opportunity Shop and turn them into grants for community organizations – into meals and shelters and job training. These people don’t settle for knee jerk charity. They visit the places seeking help; they talk with the staff; in some cases, they visit with the clients. They learn what poverty on the ground looks like in our city and extend our reach as the body of Christ in the world. They help us all to do something great as a parish for God. There are many ministries in our common life which exist to glorify God; I’m glad we get to lift up this one today. It’s one of which Moses (and Jesus) might be rather proud.

But that’s not the only Moses-Jesus connection I find today. Jesus’ words in the Gospel – seemingly harsh at first - make more sense, at least to me, in light of Moses’ story. It wasn’t too late for Moses to do something great in the world for God. Nor is it too late for the fig tree in Jesus’ parable, despite the years of barrenness, the less than stellar track record. It might just bear fruit yet. We may have more distractions and demons to fight this year than most, but I’m OK with our odds for getting through this wilderness to the other side - because in the end, it’s not about us and what we bring to the table, our redeeming qualities, our marketable skills, our good intentions. It’s about the One who says “I will be with you,” no matter how long we find ourselves wandering. The good news of the Gospel is that we won’t be in the wilderness forever.

Eventually we will find our way to the cross. And yes, it will get worse before it gets better, but even that’s not the end. Why? Because Easter is coming. We can’t see it yet. We can’t predict, and God knows we can’t control what new life will look like. But it is as sure as the dawn. I don’t know how we’re going to get there but, thank God, I do know where we’re going. Easter’s coming. Amen.