On Sunday, June 17th, we welcomed the newest member of our staff, Bingham Powell. Bingham graduated, with honors, from Virginia Theological Seminary May 16th. Bingham also received the first award ever of the St. George’s College Prize for study at St. George’s College in Jerusalem. He will spend two weeks there sometime in the next two years taking their “Palenstine of Jesus” course. Bingham was ordained as a Transitional Deacon on Saturday, June 2nd at St. Paul’s Episcopal Church in Salem, Virginia. Fr. Ted and Louise Powell, Bingham’s sister and St. Mary’s Office Manager, flew to Virginia on Friday, June 1st, to represent St. Mary’s at his ordination. Bingham will be a Transitional Deacon for his first six months with us. God willing, he will then be ordained as a priest in December. As a deacon he won’t be able to celebrate the Eucharist, as that is the role of a priest or bishop. He will, however, be participating in services by preaching and, along with St. Mary’s six other deacons, fulfilling the four main service functions of a deacon which are: proclaim the Gospel, lead us in confession, set the table for communion, and dismiss us and send us out into the world at the end of each service.