Diocese of New Jersey | About the Diocese

At Convention two years ago, the Companion Diocese Committee proposed we pledge $200,000 to build 50 houses to be a part of the response to rebuild homes after devastating earthquakes that year. Last year by Convention 29 parishes had pledged a total of $68,000 toward that rebuilding. This December $130,000 has been pledged. The Diocese of New Jersey will pay for all 34 homes that make up the first ERD-Diocese of El Salvador project. It will include infrastructure -a school, a church, and a community center/clinic in the town of Izalco.

Before the earthquake the Companion Diocese had been supporting Christian Education for the development of the Diocese of El Salvador's clergy and lay leadership. We pledged to support the work the Rev Hannah Atkins started. Hannah was a missionary from our Diocese. Now a clergy couple from Canada runs this leadership development program and serve in several Parishes. We are striving to provide $14,000 a year for the missionaries' living expenses, local transportation expenses, and materials for the development of Christian Education of all kinds.

In February 2005, a Companion Diocese-sponsored adult group of five clergy and six lay people visited the present churches and potential future development sites. The Reverend Lisa Mitchell and Sarah Stewart sponsored a youth trip to El Salvador in August 2005 to lead a vacation Bible School with their youth and share in a retreat with some thirty youth of the Companion Diocese.

The fifth annual Youth event will be in our Diocese this summer. A group of sixteen have been selected and are planning to visit us from August 1 to August 15. Plans are under way.

Thank you to all the parishes who have contributed and pledged to the several projects we are supporting in El Salvador.

The Reverend Canon Servio R. Moscoso
Chair

More information:

Companion Diocese Commitee report for 2006 (PDF)

You can find out more about the Episcopal Church in El Salvador by visting the website of Cristosal, an independent Episcopal foundation supporting the church in El Salvador. It contains full listings of the clergy and parishes, in addition to news