Effective Preaching begins in the spirituality of the homilist, takes root in scripture, draws on the simple discipline of structure and blossoms with creative possibilities. All of these elements will be explored in community with an eye to practical application in the pulpit.
The Rev. Dr. Francis H. Wade is a graduate of The Citadel and the Virginia Theological Seminary who has served as an Episcopal priest since 1966. After serving congregations in his native West Virginia for seventeen years, he was called as Rector of St. Alban’s Parish adjacent to the Washington National Cathedral. He is an adjunct faculty member at Virginia Theological Seminary in Alexandria and has taught Pastoral Theology at both General and Virginia Seminaries. In 2012 he served as Interim Dean of Washington National Cathedral. In 2013 he received an honorary doctorate from The Virginia Seminary. He served as Interim Dean of Students at that seminary in the 2016-2017 academic year. Mary Jane Criss, his wife of fifty-two years, died in 2015. In 2018 he married Ms. Carter Lee Kelly. He has two children and five grandchildren.