Worship

We lift our hearts to God. Come and celebrate His Word with us.

Worship

We lift our hearts to God. Come and celebrate His Word with us.

SUNDAY SERVICE LIVESTREAM

Our Sunday service takes place at 10:00 AM. It is a time for us to gather, dedicate to the Lord, and give thanks for our blessings.

Our livestream Sunday service allows our parishioners to stay connected to God and each other during this time. We will continue to pray for the health and safety of all.

Watch Sunday Service LIVE

OUR SERVICES

Sundays
10:00 AM–11:00 AM

Due to current COVID-19 guidelines, all services are livestream only. In-person services will resume once it is safe to do so and based on local, state, and national guidelines. Keep checking our website for the most up-to-date information.

MUSIC

Oh come, let us sing to the Lord; let us make a joyful noise to the rock of our salvation!
– Psalm 95:1

Our long-standing music program is led by our Parish Music Director and organist John Karl Hirten and includes a children’s worship choir and adult worship choir. A Frobenius organ, custom-made in Denmark for our church in 1989, enhances many musical selections.

The American Bach Soloists, a musical group founded at St Stephen’s in 1989, are our Artists-in-Residence.

St Stephen’s also serves as a music and recording venue for music groups as well as a rehearsal space for the Marin Men’s Chorus.

Learn more about music at St Stephen’s

CELEBRATIONS OF LIFE AND LOVE

Note: Only funerals of small size are currently permitted due to COVID-19.

Baptisms

People of all ages may be baptized. We perform baptisms to anyone who wishes to become an official member of our congregation.

Weddings

Weddings are a celebration of the connection between two people that God has brought together. Let us be a part of your big day.

Funerals

We are here for everyone through every stage of life. We provide funeral services and help loved ones make arrangements.

The Majesty and Intimacy of Rite I

Rite I and Rite II of the Service of Holy Eucharist in the Book of Common Prayer use largely the same language, the primary difference between them being Rite II’s adoption of the more formal second person pronoun ‘you’ instead of the more intimate and majestic Elizabethan ‘thou’.

In French to this day, and Spanish has something similar, ‘tu’, like ‘thou’, is an intimate. And in a formal, polite situation with somebody you don’t know, or someone you are respecting, for example your French teacher, you use ‘vous’. You’d never use ‘tu’. You’d never address her with ‘tu’. It would be inappropriate; she’s your teacher.

And ‘thou’ is analogous to the French ‘tu’, and ‘you’ is analogous to the French ‘vous’ which is the formal. And if we don’t know better, if we’re uneducated or naïve, as I certainly was until I was taught, we hear ‘Thou’ and think, “Wow, that’s so formal; that’s so cold and distant,” while actually it’s precisely the opposite if we begin to understand one of the elementary principles of Elizabethan English.

We talk of ‘taking on’ something, as well as giving up something, for Lent. By putting Rite I in our mouths during this season of preparation for Easter—roughly a tenth of a year’s Sundays, a tithe—we keep faith with the people who came before us, the godly souls who handed down to our generation in this place the Book of Common Prayer tradition, the people who put up the building which does so much for us. We pray with them every Sunday, “with Angels and Archangels, and with all the company of heaven,” and whenever we use Rite I we make them, once our neighbors, our neighbors once again.

This is one reason, there are others I could talk about another time, why Rite I language is unsurpassable. It is more majestic and, at the same time, more intimate. In Rite I we speak with God, with God!, the way we speak with an intimate. And that, my friends, is awesome.

—PCE, Jr

UNDERSTANDING EPISCOPAL WORSHIP

Learn more about what it means to be a part of the Episcopal church.

UNDERSTANDING EPISCOPAL WORSHIP

Learn more about what it means to be a part of the Episcopal church.

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