About Us

The regular members of our community come from all over Auckland, although we are predominantly from the local area. We continue to grow and develop as we discover what it means to be church in the third millennium.

We take our faith seriously and, as Anglicans should, we appeal to Scripture, Reason, and Tradition to nurture our faith. This means we believe in the Bible, though we are not literalists. We pay attention to what ‘all the saints’ — scholars, mystics, and fellow pilgrims — have said about the meaning of their lives, the meanings in scripture, and how to understand church doctrine.

We try to strike a balance between having enough going on in the parish to sustain us as a community and not so much happening that we use huge amounts of energy and resources entirely on ourselves. We know how to have a good party together and we hear the call to give ourselves for others.

There is a great diversity of people at All Saints. Everyone of every age and condition is welcome. We pray that we can be as hospitable, inclusive, and compassionate as Jesus encouraged his first disciples to be so every one finds a welcome here. We don’t always agree with each other but we manage to get along, have some fun, and encourage each other as we seek to be the Body of Christ in this part of God’s creation.

is the Vicar of All Saints Ponsonby. Born and raised in Sri Lanka he has been living in New Zealand permanently with his family since 2003. He was made a deacon in 1987 and ordained to priesthood in 1988 in the Anglican Diocese of Colombo. He served in urban and rural parishes and the National Christian Council in Sri Lanka for 15 years. He completed a Master of Theology at the University of Auckland in 2001 under a scholarship from St Johns College. Following this, he returned to the Diocese of Colombo, Sri Lanka for two years. He migrated to New Zealand with his family to the Waitakere Methodist Parish in 2003. Since then, he has served as a parish minister, district superintendent, director for overseas mission and ecumenical work and as National President of the Methodist Church of New Zealand from 2016 to 2018.

Patrice Jones is the Parish Administrator for All Saints Ponsonby, having returned to this role after a three-year break. She previously served as Parish Administrator for several years and is excited to be back contributing to the community.

As a mother of two teenagers, Patrice brings a strong sense of family and dedication to her work. Prior to starting a family, she worked in a variety of roles in Telecommunications and IT, which has provided her with a diverse skill set and problem-solving abilities that she brings to her role at the Parish.

Patrice’s normal office hours are Tuesday, Wednesday, and Friday from 9 am to 1 pm. She is committed to supporting the mission and daily operations of All Saints, ensuring everything runs smoothly and effectively.

Patrice is delighted to be serving the Parish once again and looks forward to working alongside the wonderful team and community of All Saints Ponsonby.

“Vestry” originally referred to the room in the church “in which the vestments, vessels, and other requisites for worship are kept and in which the clergy “robe” (The Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church).

However, since the vestry was the room in which church business meetings took place, the word also came to mean “an elective body…composed of the vicar and a group of elected parishioners administering the temporal affairs of the parish”

The Vestry in an Anglican church meets routinely, usually monthly, to give leadership and oversight to the mission and ministry of the congregation Vestry is the executive committee of the parish and is elected annually.

While Vestry members are responsible for the planning and financial matters of the parish other groups of parishioners fulfil various needs in the parish life:

• Welcoming
• Reading
• Leading prayers
• Leading worship
• Altar serving
• Morning teas
• Flowers
• Hospitality
• Cleaning
• Fundraising
• Function organising
• Maintenance
• Public relations
• Lawns and garden
• Junior Church

The diocese archives also hold the Minutes and other church records.

However these records are not available electronically so any queries would have to come through Archives via email.

For further information or to contact the archives please visit the Auckland Anglican Archive pages: https://aucklandanglican.org.nz/archives/