Other Outreach at St. John's Lafayette

Support Groups

St. John’s gives space to several meetings of Alcoholics Anonymous or other Twelve Step-based recovery programs on six days of the week. Meetings and storage space for each group are on the Outreach Level of the church buildings. The meetings have full privacy and their own building access.

  • AA Meetings: Monday at 8:00 p.m., Tuesday at 7:30 p.m., Thursday at 1 and 6:45 p.m., Friday at 10 p.m., Saturday at 11:30 a.m. (every other week) and 10 p.m. Not all of these are open meetings. To learn of other AA meetings phone Alcoholics Anonymous in Lafayette at 742-1666.

  • OA Meetings: Wednesday at 7:00 p.m. and Saturday at 10:00 a.m.

  • SAA Meeting: Sunday at 6:30 p.m.

Community Performing Arts

St. John’s seeks to share our building space as possible with appropriately sized not-for-profit community organizations whose mission is in agreement with the baptismal vows of the Prayer Book.

  • A modest fee is charged for this use to defray the cost of security and custodial staff. All "non St. John’s groups" must sign a "Hold Harmless" statement.

  • Applications and availability information can be obtained from the Building Use Coordinator, and that name can be obtained by contacting the parish office.

  • If the space requested is the nave (Sunday worship space), parish vestry approval is required of all first-time users. The vestry meets monthly except July. The nave is “blacked out” to non-parish use during the last week of Lent (the week before Palm Sunday) as well as the entire season of Advent.

  • Chancel Players, the Lafayette Chamber Singers, and the Chamber Music Society are some of the organizations that have used St. John’s in the recent past. 

  • There is an even more modest fee schedule for smaller performance groups (fewer than 8 persons).

For information about using St. John's facilities, please contact our building use coordinator Bill McInerney.

Hospitality Meals

Hospitality Meals are available for persons who come to the church in need of a quick meal. (We keep no cash on hand with which to purchase individual meals.) These meals are located in the parish kitchen so that any staff member or parishioner can access them for distribution as needed.

  • The Youth Group prepares and replenishes a stock of meals as needed. The meal consists of packaged meats and cheeses, fruit and pudding cups, crackers and bottled water, napkins and plastic ware.

  • Parish Outreach Fund covers the cost.

LUM Community Thanksgiving Meal

Every Thanksgiving LUM sponsors this community meal that serves approximately 300 persons. It is served at Central Presbyterian Church.

  • St. John’s helps by providing several cooked and boned turkeys, and other food items as requested. Volunteers cook and carve the turkeys at home or at the church kitchen. Turkeys are delivered on Thanksgiving morning to the meal site.

  • A call-out for turkey cooks is made during Sunday services as Thanksgiving approaches.

  • The Rector’s Discretionary Fund can provide foil cooking pans, and reimburse the cost of the turkeys as needed.

Annual Offerings

During the course of the church year, several specific offerings are taken up from the congregation to support various diocesan and church-wide ministries.

  • The United Thank Offering is gathered in the spring and fall and ultimately distributed to ministry programs throughout the Episcopal Church and Anglican Communion.

  • An offering for Episcopal Relief and Development is taken in conjunction with Lenten study resources, or on the occasion of specific disasters which leave persons in need. This money is distributed through ERD in concert with the local Anglican authorities and ecumenical partners throughout the world.

  • An offering for the Church in Jerusalem and the Middle East is taken during Holy Week.

  • On a Sunday near the feast of Pentecost (late May/early June) we share in a diocesan-wide offering for the Episcopal Fund for Human Need (EFHN), which assists parish and community ministries throughout our diocese.

  • On the occasion of the bishop’s canonical visitation, an offering is taken for the Bishop’s Discretionary Fund, which is used to meet emergency needs throughout the diocese.

Parish Discretionary Funds

There are three, under exclusive control of the clergy. They are funded by the gifts of individual parishioners, honoraria given the clergy at the time of sacramental ministrations, and a line item of the parish operating budget.

  • The funds are used for a variety of human needs, both within and outside the parish.

  • Rent or utility assistance, medical or pharmaceutical assistance, gasoline or lodging needs, flowers for the funeral of a child, as well as financial support of existing or new outreach efforts, are among situations the Discretionary Funds address.

For more information

For more information about these or any other Outreach ministries, please contact St. John's Episcopal Church by EMAIL or at 765.742.4079.