Good Friday Offering

Creating new relationships in and among the Christians of the Middle East

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As The Episcopal Church’s Good Friday Offering prepares to mark 102 years, Presiding Bishop Michael Curry invites the whole church to an afternoon of sacred music and collective giving to support siblings in Jerusalem and the Middle East.

Recorded at Christ and St. Luke’s Church, Norfolk, in the Episcopal Diocese of Southern Virginia, A Concert for the Good Friday Offering will air online at 3 p.m. ET March 29 on The Episcopal Church’s Facebook page, YouTube channel, and website. Viewers will have the opportunity to make donations during the event to go toward the offering, also frequently gathered by churches during Good Friday services.

“We will not forget those caught in the crossfire between warring factions in the land where our Lord walked,” Curry writes in his annual Lent letter to Episcopal churches. “As we mark our Lord’s passion and death on Good Friday, we remember those whom he loves facing injustice and oppression today, and remember the urgency of love—true, sacrificial love.”

Program Leaflet

The history of the Good Friday Offering reaches back to 1922 when, in the aftermath of World War I, The Episcopal Church sought to create new relationships with and among the Christians of the Middle East. From these initial efforts which focused on a combination of relief work and the improvement of ecumenical and Anglican relations, the Good Friday Offering was created.

Through the years many Episcopalians have found the Good Friday Offering to be an effective way to express their support for the ministries of the three dioceses of the Province of Jerusalem and the Middle East. Pastoral care, education and health care continue to be primary ministries through which the reconciling spirit of the Christian faith serves all in need. Participation in this ministry is welcome. The generous donations of Episcopalians help the Christian presence in the Land of the Holy One to be a vital and effective force for peace and understanding among all of God’s children.

For 102 years, Episcopalians have generously shared their love, compassion, and financial gifts to support the ministry of the Anglican Communion Province of Jerusalem and the Middle East. These gifts have made an astounding difference in the lives of many people in the homeland of Jesus and beyond. Check out our history of the Good Friday Offering to learn more about this life-changing ministry.


This year, join the Good Friday Offering:

READ the presiding bishop’s letter.

Last May, I had the privilege of meeting the Rev. Canon Faiz Basheer Jerjes and his colleague, Sinan Hanna, of St. George’s Anglican Episcopal Church in Baghdad—the only Anglican church in Iraq. After a moving conversation, Fr. Faiz asked one thing of our church: “Please don’t forget us.”

I assured him that we would not forget— and I need your help to honor that pledge, not only to him, but to the whole Anglican Province of Jerusalem and the Middle East, which we have supported through the Good Friday Offering for over a century, through conflict, pandemic, and humanitarian disasters. The Episcopal Church will not forget them. We will not forget our siblings in Christ who cannot worship God freely. We will not forget those caught in the crossfire between warring factions in the land where our Lord walked. We will not forget that every human child of God— Palestinian, Israeli, Iraqi, Cypriot, Lebanese, everyone—deserves safety and security. As we mark our Lord’s passion and death on Good Friday, we remember those whom he loves facing injustice and oppression today, and remember the urgency of love—true, sacrificial love.

Read the whole letter here.

Photo: Wissam Nassar/dpa

By supporting life-giving ministries in the Anglican Province of Jerusalem and the Middle East, including St. George’s, Baghdad; the eye clinic in Ras Morbat, Yemen; the Al Ahli Arab Hospital in Gaza; and numerous other institutions identified by their dioceses, you are ensuring that our siblings in Christ are not forgotten. 

  • Al Ahli Arab Hospital in Gaza City provides critical medical care to all people, in peacetime and wartime alike. 
  • St. George’s is the only Anglican church in Iraq, serving local Indigenous communities and displaced people through worship, schools, and medical care. 
  • Christ Church in Aden, Yemen, serves as the grounds of Ras Morbat Eye Clinic, providing critical medical care for all in a war-torn country. 
  • The Christian National Kindergarten at St. Philip’s Episcopal Church, Nablus, in the West Bank, provides high-quality early education to all kindergartners, regardless of religion. 

Watch the first-ever Good Friday Offering concert of sacred music, created at Christ and St. Luke’s Episcopal Church, Norfolk, in the Episcopal Diocese of Southern Virginia, and streaming on episcopalchurch.org and our social media channels on Good Friday, March 29. During the concert our invited guests will speak about the loving, liberating, and lifesaving work supported by the Good Friday Offering.

Please make a gift to the Good Friday Offering in one of the following ways: 

  1. Click here to give securely on this page
  2. To give via phone or for gifts of stock, call (800) 334-7626 x6002. 
  3. Send check to:  
    DFMS-Protestant Episcopal Church US 
    P.O. Box 958983 
    St. Louis, MO 63195-8983 
    Make your check payable to: The Domestic and Foreign Missionary Society with “Good Friday Offering” in the memo field.  

Thank you. The Good Friday Offering affirms the dignity of the poor, the war-torn, and those in desperate need as God’s ministry is done. Thank you for spreading hope’s message through your gifts and prayers. 


2024 Good Friday Offering Resources

Jerusalem

Cyprus and the Gulf

History of the Good Friday Offering

Need help making your gift online  or want to make your gift over the phone? Please email April Frazier, Gift Processing Officer at April Frazier or call (212)-716-6002.

To make a donation to the Good Friday Offering by mail, please write a check payable to the Domestic and Foreign Missionary Society, write “Good Friday Offering” in the memo line, and mail to:

DFMS – Protestant Episcopal Church US
P.O. Box 958983
St. Louis, MO 63195-8983


Contact:
Archdeacon Paul Feheley

Partnership Officer for the Middle East

Click here

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