Image: The Rt Revd Dr Joanne Woolway Grenfell with Commissioned Pastoral Assistants (left to right) Lorraine Flack, Patricia Johnson, Sandra Hall, Sheryl Hendrickson, Amanda Bart-Plange, Helen Corcoran, Chloe Selby, Kathryn Rose, Boachie Dankwah, Cicely Etienne, Valerie Roach and Basil Weekes
Pastoral Care in Hackney and Islington was given a great boost when The Bishop of Stepney, the Rt Rev Dr Joanne Woolway Grenfell commissioned four new Pastoral Assistants on Sunday 23rd July at Hope Church Islington. Lorraine Flack from St John Hoxton, Valerie Roach from St Barnabas Homerton, Chloe Selby from Hope Church and Sheryl Hendrickson from St John Upper Holloway joined those who were being re-commissioned across churches in Stepney.
Their important ministries include running a warm hub at St John’s Hoxton, volunteering for St Joseph’s hospice and North London Action for the Homeless, running a church café at St Barnabas Homerton, visiting the elderly and sick, helping at the Hackney Posh club and supporting a wellbeing space for the community at St John’s Brownswood Park as part of Renew N4.
The Bishop of Stepney said:
Pastoral Assistants fulfil a vital gospel ministry. Their work is patient and often unseen, as they build bridges between church and community, and between people in many different life situations. I pray that our new pastoral assistants will be the hands and feet of Jesus in the world to the people of Hackney and Islington.
Stepney has twenty-three Commissioned Pastoral Assistants working in churches in Tower Hamlets, Islington and Hackney.