Visit Virginia’s First Church Sites

This year is the 400th anniversary of the first Virginia Assembly and the arrival of the first enslaved Africans to Virginia. Our day-long pilgrimage will visit two of the earliest church sites in British North America and the recreated historic site, Jamestown Settlement. The first stop of the day will be the museum and the recreated church at the Jamestown Settlement. Guided by the Reverend Hilary Streever and parishioner and historian Mary Richie McGuire, we will explore how the English Reformation, Anglican architecture, and theological and scientific literature crossed the Atlantic and shaped settlement, religion, natural history, and slavery in early Virginia.

We will proceed to Historic Jamestown, part of Colonial National Historical Park, for a guided tour of the archeological site of the first Anglican churches in the English colonies founded on Jamestown Island in 1607. Our final afternoon stop will be a guided tour of Bruton Parish Episcopal Church and grounds, established in Williamsburg in 1674. We will conclude this 12th day of Advent with dinner and an evening stroll through Colonial Williamsburg in its holiday finery.

The $105 fee covers the bus ticket, admission to the Jamestown Settlement (museum and park) and Historic Jamestown, and the guided tour of Bruton Parish. Meals are not included. Lunch is available for purchase at the Café at Jamestown Settlement and The Dale House Café at Historic Jamestown. Dinner is available for purchase in Colonial Williamsburg at Merchant’s Square and Chowning’s Tavern.
Limited to 14  pilgrims.

Thursday, December 12, 2019 – Historic Jamestown and Historic Williamsburg
Leave St. James’s at 8:00 a.m.; return at 8:00 p.m.
Cost: $105 (bus ticket and admissions)

Register here by November 17, 2019.
For more information, contact Mary Richie McGuire or Dale Kalkofen.