The Episcopal Church of the Epiphany of San Carlos, California, is a parish in the Episcopal Diocese of California, and part of the Episcopal Church in the United States of America (ECUSA). Within its community the parish is normally referred to as simply The Church of the Epiphany.
Location
The church building and parish hall are located at 1839 Arroyo Avenue, San Carlos, California, at the corner of Cedar Street and Arroyo Avenue. This is a residential area, across from a large city park, Burton Park. On some Sundays, such as Palm Sunday, the 10 am service may start in the park and proceed into the church.
Outreach and service
The Church of the Epiphany has active outreach and service activities within its own parish, within the San Francisco Bay Area, the United States, and internationally. There are too many such activities, and they change too frequently, to be listed here: a complete list is found at the church web site. But an example of each of these include:
Local parish work: Lay Eucharist ministers bring communion to homebound or hospitalized parishioners.
Bay area work: The Interfaith Hospitality Network (IHN) at program brings shelter, meals and support services to families without homes. Churches of several different faiths participate in this program. The families in the program are housed at Epiphany for a one to two week stay, in rotation with other churches.
National Outreach: Each year the Church of the Epiphany sends its youth on a mission trip to grow spiritually and engage in service. Before 2006 these trips went to Mexico, but since then missions have involved been coordinated with the Group Workcamps Foundation, and have involved home-repair projects such as roofing and painting, for low-income people living in U.S.
International service: Epiphany supports human rights by signing and mailing letters supporting prisoners of conscience and victims of torture. Information for the letters is obtained through human rights organizations such as Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch.
Education
The Church of the Epiphany has served the education of young people with nursery, church school and multiple youth activities since it was founded in 1947. The staff includes a full-time youth minister and many volunteers.
Music
The Church of the Epiphany has a professional Director of Music, an organist, and frequently adds other professional musicians to augment its services. The Chapel Choir, made up of parish volunteers, performs each Sunday at the 10 am sung service, and youth choir also performs on special occasions. Musical facilities include a Praeludium III Galanti digital organ and an historic, 1927 Stretch A3 Steinway grand piano.
Facilities
The church building, parish hall, classrooms, business offices, and play yard occupy approximately two-thirds of an acre and are surrounded by mature trees and landscaped grounds.
The Gothic-style church has a nave and sanctuary arranged in a miniature cathedral fashion. The nave seats 325. Forty-two stained glass windows located on all four walls of the sanctuary depict the four Gospel Evangelists and various Biblical themes. The chapel, which opens off the nave, is used for special services and for post-communion healing prayer. It seats approximately 25. Eight brightly colored tapestries, woven by a parishioner, hang on the rear wall of the church and behind the altars in the sanctuary and the chapel.
The parish hall, Eastburn Hall, seats approximately 175 for meetings. The building also houses classrooms, a library, a nursery, a nursery school, and staff offices. Several community groups, such as the Interfaith Hospitality Network, Alcoholics Anonymous, and the Girl Scouts, use Eastburn Hall on a regular basis.
The Church of the Epiphany has a long-term relationship with Sequoia Parents' Nursery School , a pre-school program for children ages 3 through 5 and their parents sponsored by the Sequoia Union High School District.
Clergy
The Church of the Epiphany installed the Rev. Melanie Donahoe as its eighth rector in 2009. The Rt. Rev. Marc Handley Andrus was elected and installed as eighth bishop of the Episcopal Diocese of California in 2006. The Most Rev. Dr. Katharine Jefferts Schori elected as the twenty-sixth Presiding Bishop of the Episcopal Church in the United States of America (ECUSA) in 2006. A complete historical listing of all of Epiphany's rectors is available at the church web site.