What is a Johannite?

Many of us seek a real spiritual community which is loving, inclusive, spiritually lively and empowering of people of all genders, races and sexualities, both rich and poor.

The Johannite tradition represents just such a community: founded by Saint John the beloved disciple of Jesus, rooted in the tradition of John the Baptist and guided by direct, experiential contact with the Divine, this tradition encourages personal responsibility and freedom of thought and practice.

The Apostolic Johannite Church is a global network of Johannite communities that focus on supporting individual and direct experience of the Divine through fellowship, meditation and prayer, service and ritual, lively discussion and study.

We fully embrace the beauty and mystery of the living Christian tradition: candles and incense, ancient rites such as baptism and the eucharist and robed male and female priests. We also delight in the freedoms to choose how we understand our tradition and to explore other paths that are among the particular gifts of our modern world.

Your journey to come to personal knowledge of the Divine is yours alone but it is our experience that we all benefit from companions on the road, good books to read, educated conversation and a place to gather with others to share the fruits of our journey in prayer, praise and blessing.

We draw inspiration from many sources: the Hebrew Bible and the Christian New Testament, the Corpus Hermeticum, and Gnostic Scriptures such as the Gospel of Thomas and the Secret Book of John. We understand these texts as inspiration, poetry and symbolism, rather than making a literal reading of them as books of rules.

Saint Sarah’s Parish

We began as a tiny band of seekers 10 years ago, and grew into being one of the largest and most active Gnostic communities within the international communion of the Apostolic Johannite Church. 

St. Sarah’s is radically inclusive and socially engaged.  It is a parish with deep roots in ancient Gnostic and esoteric traditions and wisdom, but equally a safe space for exploring new spiritual insights and employing reason, logic and compassion in our approach to the world, our spirituality, and ourselves.

Parish Leadership Team