Sunday Services at 8 a.m., 9 a.m. and 11:15 a.m. · Details

  435 Peachtree Street NE, Atlanta, GA 30308  ·   404-873-7600  ·         Give

St. Luke's Episcopal Church
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Becoming a Member

Member Login

Membership in the Episcopal Church comes through Baptism and Confirmation. Baptism is offered five times per year. Confirmation, which coincides with a visitation from our Bishop, occurs once per year. An Inquirer's Class for those who wish to learn more about the church and membership is offered each year beginning in January and concluding in the early spring. Persons interested in membership are encouraged to attend this class and may also contact the Rector or any of the associate priests to discuss membership and other questions on a more personal basis.

How do I become a member of St. Luke’s?
Becoming a member of St. Luke’s can happen in several ways, depending on your experience with either other Episcopal congregations or other denominations. However, you need not have ever been a church-goer before to become a member of our church. Here are the categories of membership we recognize at St. Luke’s:

Confirmed Communicants: These are adults (persons over 16 years of age) who have been baptized and confirmed in, or received into, the Episcopal Church either by confirmation, reception, or letter of transfer from another Episcopal Church. If you are coming from another Episcopal Church, simply request that Michelle Jemmott on our staff send a request for a letter of transfer to your last parish and you can be enrolled as a member when that letter is received.

Baptized Members: These include baptized persons, of any age (including children), whose names are enrolled either by baptism, letter of transfer, or personal request. Adults can have their names enrolled as Baptized Members, but still not be Confirmed Communicants. If you are an adult and have been baptized in and Episcopal or other Christian denomination, again, simply ask Michelle Jemmott to request a letter of transfer from your last parish and you can be enrolled as a member.

Associate members: These are persons who are active in the life of this congregation (through worship, giving or program participation), but their official membership remains elsewhere.

Prospective members: These are persons who are visiting our church and are deciding whether to become a Confirmed or Baptized member.

FAQ’s about membership:

Why become a member?

While everyone is welcome at St. Luke’s and invited to participate in the life of our community, becoming a member is an outward sign of commitment that formally joins you and your family with us in this congregation. Membership does bring some additional benefits, but more importantly is a statement that you intend to become part of the congregation in a deeper and more meaningful way. Only active members in good standing can vote in the annual meeting, be elected to the Vestry and host a wedding in the church.

What if I have never been baptized?

Adults and their children may join St. Luke’s by being baptized on one of the five special days set aside for baptisms each year. These are advertised in the bulletin on a regular basis. You can find out more about baptism by talking Heather Chase, our director of children's education & formation or one of the clergy.

Do I need to be confirmed to be a member?

Not necessarily. To be a member in good standing in an Episcopal Church, you must be confirmed, attend and give regularly, and actively join in the life of the church. But anyone can attend services, receive communion and participate in programs and classes without being confirmed.

What is Confirmation?

Confirmation is a sacramental rite that enables adults, persons over 16 years of age, to make their own profession of faith and be formally received into the Episcopal Church. The Inquirer’s Class for adults and Sunday school classes for youth are essential as preparation for this step. Confirmation is held when the Bishop visits our parish, usually once a year on Pentecost. You may also be confirmed at one of the Diocesan Confirmations, which are held several times a year at the Cathedral of St. Philip.

What if I have been confirmed in another denomination?

If you have made an adult profession of faith in another Christian denomination, you may be received into the Episcopal Church. This is also done when the Bishop visits each year. Need more information? Contact Mark Simmons, director of membership, for details.


Joining St. Luke’s
If you are interested in becoming a member of St. Luke’s please contact the Mark Simmons, our director of membership, at [email protected] to receive a membership form. After we receive your completed form, we will contact you to discuss your options for membership and make a plan together that meets your interests and needs.

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The Rev. Winnie Varghese
Rector
404-873-7610 
The Rev. Elizabeth Shows Caffey
Senior Associate Rector, ​Liturgy and Education
The Rev. Dr. Horace L. Griffin
Associate Priest for Pastoral Care
404-873-7609 
Matthew Brown
Director of Music
404-873-7620 
Mark Simmons
Director of Membership & Stewardship
404-873-7624 

The Rev. Winnie Varghese

Rector
404-873-7610 |

A national leader in the Episcopal Church, the Rev. Winnie Varghese is known for her inspired writing, teaching and preaching. Before becoming the 23rd rector of St. Luke's, she served as Priest for Ministry and Program Coordination at Trinity Church Wall Street in New York City.

Prior to Trinity, Winnie served as Rector and Priest-in-Charge at St. Mark’s in the Bowery in New York. Winnie was also Chaplain at both Columbia University and University of California Los Angeles. She is a native of Dallas, Texas and is married to Elizabeth Toledo, a public relations executive. They have two grown children.

Winnie serves on the Board of Trustees of Union Theological Seminary, she chaired the General Convention’s Committee on the State of the Church from 2015 to 2018, and she served on the Board of Trustees of the Episcopal Divinity School, 2013-2016. She is also a published author, editor, and podcaster.

Winnie’s parents immigrated to the United States from India, and Winnie spent part of her early childhood years there. She attended Agnes Scott College in Decatur, GA and earned her bachelor’s degree from Southern Methodist University in Dallas. She then attended Union Theological Seminary and graduated with her Master of Divinity degree in 1999. She was ordained to the deaconate in Los Angeles in 1999 and to the priesthood six months later in 2000.

The Rev. Elizabeth Shows Caffey

Senior Associate Rector, ​Liturgy and Education

Elizabeth has served at St. Lukes since February 2015. Elizabeth has a passion for liturgy and a love for all things community. Her focus is around fostering opportunities for spiritual development and growth. Before seminary she developed and subsequently directed the Johnson Intern Program at Chapel of the Cross, an Episcopal Service Corps program in Chapel Hill, NC while also working as the family coordinator for Chatham Habitat for Humanity. She has served at the Church of the Holy Trinity in New York City and All Saints’ Episcopal Church in Atlanta as the priest for outreach, liturgy and pastoral care. The connecting thread through all of Elizabeth’s work has been engaging in compelling questions about God, living as a person of great faith and intellectual inquiry, and responding with action and intention in how we live. She loves camping with her children and dogs, Ana and Fig. Elizabeth is always up for travel and adventure. Having been raised in North Carolina and as an alumni of the University, Elizabeth is an avid Duke basketball fan.

The Rev. Dr. Horace L. Griffin

Associate Priest for Pastoral Care
404-873-7609 |

A graduate of Morehouse College, Boston University, and Vanderbilt in theological studies, Horace came to St. Luke's in July 2017 after a twenty-seven year vocation as a college and seminary professor and hospital chaplain. While he has served on a part-time basis at a number of parishes, currently he has oversight for the pastoral care ministry and provides leadership for the fifteen Community Ministries here at St. Luke’s.

An award-winning author of the groundbreaking, Their Own Receive Them Not: African American Lesbians and Gays in the Black Church, he was ordained to the Episcopal priesthood in 2005 and has passionately devoted his parish ministry to social justice, racial reconciliation and LBGTQ equality in the Church.

His fundamental belief that we are called to love God and treat all humans with love and equal justice is at the heart of his ministry. When he is not working on making the world a better place, he enjoys music, concerts, and film. He is interested in reading books on religion, African American and Gay history, and First Ladies.

Matthew Brown

Director of Music
404-873-7620 |

Matthew Michael Brown was appointed Director of Music at St. Luke’s in February, 2020. At St. Luke’s, he oversees a comprehensive sacred music program and is the Founder and Artistic Director of the Music at St. Luke’s series.

He has concertized throughout the USA and abroad, and several performances have been heard in radio broadcasts of American Public Media’s Pipe Dreams and the nationally syndicated program, With Heart and Voice. As a concert artist, he has performed in Westminster Abbey and St. Paul’s Cathedral, London; Barcelona Cathedral, Spain; Grace Cathedral, San Francisco; Washington National Cathedral; Saint Thomas Church Fifth Avenue, New York; Princeton University Chapel; Assembly Hall of the Mormon Tabernacle; Trinity Church on Copley Square, Boston; Cathedral of St. Philip, Atlanta; Cathedral Church of the Advent, Birmingham; Grace Church Cathedral, Charleston; and Christ Church Cathedral, Nashville. He has premiered works by prominent North Carolina composers, Kenneth Frazelle and Dan Locklair, and has facilitated commissions of new music by Barlow Bradford, David Hurd, Simon Lole, Ned Rorem, and Richard Webster. In 2023, under Matthew's leadership, St. Luke's will endeavor to become a national leader in annually commissioning music by underrepresented composers for traditional liturgies of the Episcopal Church.

He earned degrees in organ performance from the North Carolina School of the Arts and the Eastman School of Music. He also holds the Sacred Music Diploma from Eastman's Institute of Music Leadership. As a grant recipient from the Thomas S. Kenan Institute for the Arts and The Robert Carwithen Foundation, he pursued two years of post-graduate organ studies with Dame Gillian Weir. Other major teachers included David Higgs, Jack Mitchener, and Wayne Leupold. Earlier in his career, he benefited from master classes with Marie-Claire Alain, Michel Bouvard, David Craighead, and Ewald Kooiman.

He is professionally affiliated with the Association of Anglican Musicians, American Guild of Organists, American Choral Director’s Association, and the Maurice and Marie-Madeleine Duruflé Association. He currently serves on the boards of The Leupold Foundation, Atlanta's Taylor National Organ Playing Competition, and chairs the Nominating Committee for the Southeast region of the American Guild of Organists. Each summer, he manages the Royal School of Church Music in America’s Carolina Summer Choral Residency at Duke University.

Mark Simmons

Director of Membership & Stewardship
404-873-7624 |
Mark loves people! He has worked in the nonprofit world virtually his whole career with major stints at the American Red Cross and two other communities of faith. Mark’s role at St. Luke’s is to help members and newcomers make connections with people and ministries of the parish, in addition to coordinating efforts to fund the church’s ministries. He finds his work fulfilling and important because it helps him and others connect with something bigger than the self and to make the world a better place.

Mark is a Louisiana native, but considers himself fully Georgian, having lived his adult life here. He dabbles with making pottery, trying new recipes in his wok, and he always has an in-progress book on his nightstand. Mark and his partner, Kippy, have been together many years and live in Cobb County with their wirehaired dachshund. Mark loves being a part of the warm, welcoming, inquiring, and difference-making community of St. Luke’s.
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Sermons

  • Mar 19 | The Rev. Winnie Varghese
    The Fourth Sunday in Lent
  • Mar 12 | The Rev. Elizabeth Shows Caffey
    The Third Sunday in Lent
  • Mar 5 | The Rev. Winnie Varghese
    The Second Sunday in Lent
  • Feb 26 | The Rev. Dr. Gabrielle Thomas
    The First Sunday in Lent
  • Feb 19 | The Rev. Nicole Lambelet
    Last Sunday after the Epiphany

St. Luke's Episcopal Church
Atlanta, GA

435 Peachtree Street NE
Atlanta, GA 30308

Tel: 404-873-7600

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Service Times

Sunday Services at St. Luke's

  • 8 a.m. Holy Eucharist, Rite I (in person only)
  • 9 a.m. Family Worship Service with Communion (in person and live online)
  • 11:15 a.m. Holy Eucharist, Rite II (in person and live online)

Bookmark stlukesatlanta.org/live/ for live services, bulletins and updates.

St. Luke's Live


Location

St. Luke's Episcopal Church
435 Peachtree Street NE
Atlanta, GA 30308

Contact Us
404-873-7600

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