Finding the New Parish Home At Our New Home

One major part of settling into a new place a lot of times is finding a new church to attend, and in our case that was amazingly easy this time.  For the past several years, being that the typical Roman Catholic parish often has gotten too liberal and apostasized for us to remain in, we have been attending more conservative liturgical/sacramental churches, in particular traditional "Continuing" Anglican parishes.   Since 2007, we have been involved with three of those, and that is what I want to tell the story of now. 

The first parish we started attending was in October 2007, and that one was Saints Peter and Paul Mission in Clearwater.  They still meet today at the Union Street Methodist Church, in the Susannah Wesley Chapel, and are a small aging community.  A "Continuing" parish, they are part of a jurisdiction known as the Anglican Church in America, or ACA for short.  The ACA is one of the largest of these jurisdictions, and despite a recent defection of some of its parishes to unite with Rome, it is still a viable force.  SS Peter and Paul was started some years ago I believe in Tampa originally where they met in a funeral home over there, and some time later they moved to Clearwater.   We have many good friends still in that parish, and although largely elderly in membership, they are very welcoming.  

The altar of SS. Peter and Paul Anglican Mission in Clearwater, in the Susannah Wesley Chapel of Union Street Methodist Church.

Rev'd Canon Fr. Roger Rovelstad and his dear wife Ardis - the vicar of SS. Peter and Paul



Due to the fact we wanted a parish with some folks closer our age and also we were pursuing a different spiritual direction, in March 2010 we started attending St. Philip Anglican Church in nearby Pinellas Park.  St. Philip is also a "Continuing" parish, but belongs to a different jurisdiction called the Anglican Province of America, or APA, which came into being sometime around 1997.  They are also a somewhat larger and more diverse parish than SS. Peter and Paul, as they contain a lot of younger families.   Their vicar, Fr. John Poole, is also a very dynamic pastor with a wonderful sense of humor and a spiritual sensitivity to his parishioners - to tell you the truth, I never seen anyone make a very good theological message out of a jack-o-lantern, but somehow Fr. John did that (not to mention the chains at one point he used for another illustration, as well as a really cute puppet show he and his dear wife Denise put on one Sunday as well)!  Due to our move to Lakeland, we are no longer able to attend, but we really miss these great people, as they are a wonderful parish.   However, thankfully we still keep in touch with many of them, and it was a tremendous blessing being part of their community while we lived in Pinellas County.   We will definitely be visiting them on occasion, and look forward to seeing those good folks again.

St. Philip Anglican (APA) Church in Pinellas Park, FL

The altar during Christmas season 2010 - St. Philip's.

Fr. John Poole, vicar of St. Philip's

Upon our move to Lakeland recently, we became re-acquainted with an old parish we attended when we lived here years ago, and although they have had a few changes since we last attended, they are still going strong.  St. Mary Anglican Catholic Church, on Winter Lake Road a few miles west of downtown Winter Haven, is a parish of the Anglican Catholic Church, which is perhaps the oldest and most well-established of the "Continuing" Church jurisdictions.  Back when we attended there years ago, they were a part of another diocese called the Anglican Province of Christ the King (APCK) which has since entered into intercommunion with the ACC.   The new vicar there (at least he is new to us, as years ago the priest was Fr. John Riddell the last time we attended) is a practicing attorney, Fr. Guy DiMartino, who also happens to be a fellow Hebrew like myself, which is a plus!  After being under Fr. Guy's pastoral guidance for a couple of weeks, there are two things I have to say about him - for one, he is very down-to-earth, and he is also very convicting in the homilies he gives at Mass; to be honest, I haven't been that convicted in a long time, but that is a good thing, not a bad one.  We are looking forward to a long and very good relationship with this small but very vibrant parish, and I may be saying more about them as Fr. Guy is giving me some good material for some teachings on my Sacramental Present Truths blog, which I hope you all read on occasion as well (shameless plug, I know!).

St. Mary Anglican Catholic Church, Winter Haven, FL

Altar at St. Mary's

Fr. Guy DiMartino, rector of St. Mary's

Finding a spiritual home is as important part of the moving process as finding a physical home, and thankfully this was an easy process for us.   Although we ourselves are not "Continuing" Anglicans (I am part of an independent Catholic jurisdiction called the Synod of Saint Timothy, actually, but we don't have parishes in Florida unfortunately), I feel that at this juncture they are who the Lord is using to help maintain us spiritually, because overall they are solid churches with strong traditional worship yet with an openness to the Holy Spirit as well - all the vicars of the above parishes bear evidence of that, as well as evidence that the Body of Christ is diverse in leadership, as each one has their own unique gifts and presbyterial callings.  And, for those of you who may be looking for a good church home, I would recommend one of these parishes - as well as hundreds of more like them across the nation - highly to you.  Finding one may be difficult, as many are not fortunate enough to have their own facilities and may meet in the chapels of other churches, but it is worth the search if you can find one.  Also, don't be too put off if some of these parishes have an over-abundance of over-60's in them - just because they are older doesn't mean they are aliens from outer space, as they are still wonderful people you can learn a lot from too.   Also, they could use an infusion of younger constituency in many of them, and maybe God is calling you to carry on the legacy of that particular parish.  And, should you want to read up more about their teachings, go to my theological blog at http://www.sacramentalpresenttruths.blogspot.com/, and I have a lot of articles that contain some of the basic teachings that will be of service to you. 

Any rate. that is something I wanted to share today, as for some reason I just felt inspired to talk about our new parish church.  Take care until next time.