Assisting Clergy

The Reverend Canon Samuel R. D'Amico, Ph.D.

The Reverend Samuel R. D'Amico, Ph.D., was born in Wakefield, Mass., a suburb of Boston.

After attending the elementary schools there, he was awarded a scholarship to Phillips Academy, Andover, Mass, from which he was graduated in 1935. He then attended Harvard University, graduating with a B. A. Cum laude in 1939.

After teaching Latin at Stony Brook School in Long Island, N. Y. for two years, he entered the Episcopal Divinity School in Cambridge, Mass., graduating with a Master of Divinity degree in 1943. He returned to Harvard and worked toward a doctorate at the Graduate School of Education for a year, while assisting at St. Mark's Southboro, Mass. He later completed his studies at the California Graduate School of Theology in Los Angeles.

Full-time ministry began for The Reverend D'Amico in Providence, R. I., where he was the Executive Director of the Diocesan Department of Education and Canon of St. John's Cathedral from 1944 to 1947. During this period, in 1946, he married Virginia Shepard at the Church of the Transfiguration in Edgewood, N. J.

In 1947, he was called to the Diocese of Los Angeles where he served as Rector of St. Athansius in Los Angeles for six years, Holy Faith in Inglewood for nine years, St. James Wilshire for 19 years, and St. John's in Rancho Santa Margarita for four years (after retiring in 1985).

 

The Reverend Canon Shirley Rose

The Rev. Canon Shirley Rose is a native Californian; she grew up in Southern California and attended the University of the Pacific in Stockton, majoring in religious education.

She earned a master of divinity degree from the Claremont School of Theology and was ordained to the priesthood in 1988; she served on the staff of St. Matthias Episcopal Church in Whittier for 19 years, as both associate rector and as priest-in-charge during an interim period.

She has also served on the staff of St. Edmund’s Episcopal Church in San Marino. For the first year after the Evangelical Lutheran Church of American (ELCA) and the Episcopal Church entered into a full communion agreement, she served as associate pastor at St. Andrew’s Lutheran Church in Whittier. Of that experience she says emphatically, “that was a fun year.”

She also chaired the diocesan commission on education from 1987 to 1992 and was named an honorary canon of the Cathedral Church of St. Paul in 1993 by Bishop Frederick H. Borsch.

Although she retired from St. Matthias in 1998, she served as an associate rector at St. George’s staff from 2002-2003, offering a pastoral presence in Leisure World and various other retirement communities.

Since she moved to Aliso Viejo in 2004 she has been involved in the St. George’s Health Ministries, Stephen Ministry and other pastoral ministries. She continues to visit ailing parishioners and takes communion to residents at the Covington Episcopal Home.

She is married to the Rev. Roger Rose, and they have three children and five grandchildren.

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Vestry

Clergy, Staff and Laity are all St. George’s ministers, serving together for the building up of the church. Our vestry is an excellent group of caring leaders from our neighboring human services, Business and Legal communities. They have responded to a deeper call to dedicate themselves to supporting, leading and enriching the church and surrounding community.

Chuck Day, Senior Warden
Barry Brown, Junior Warden
Mercedese Bantz
Charles Hastings
Bob Howe
Scott Tanner
Joe Kellner
Terrie McKinley
Irene Bauer
Amy Givan
Linda Merkens
Liz Espiritu, Treasurer