In July, 2010, All Saints Episcopal Church joined with St. Paul's and St. Joseph's churches to form a new collaborative ministry in the town of Great Neck. This new initiative is called the Great Neck Episcopal Ministry (GEM). These three churches will share their resources and gifts for a common mission and ministry to Great Neck. Three diocesan missioners have been appointed by Bishop Lawrence Provenzano to lead GEM, The Rev. Deacon Constance Lorenz, The Rev. Charles McCarron, and The Rev. Joseph Pae. Through a renewed sense of mission, new friendships, emerging new lay leadership, and a strong presence in the community, GEM hopes that all three congregations will become even more life giving and become more self-sustaining.

Parish exterior in 1906

All Saints Episcopal Church, the oldest religious institution in Great Neck, was built in 1886 when Great Neck was a wealthy community of estates, farms, and a tiny village located at the end of the peninsula. The land upon which the church was built, Regan’s Hill, was given by the Messenger and Gignoux families.

No expense was spared in making the small church a handsome, substantial edifice. The architects designed it to look like an English rural church. The grey stone used in its construction was found on the property and in nearby fields.

The interior of the church was given equal care. Its stained glass windows include four Tiffany windows. One of them is a rendition of Psalm 121, “I will lift up mine eyes unto the hills from whence cometh my strength.” The church’s many other stained glass windows were imported from England. Dr. Silas McBee, a well known churchman, supervised the beautification of the interior of the church. The carved wood rood screen, the reredos and the niches above the altar, peopled with Saints associated with the history of the Anglican Church, the altar and the choir stalls were all exquisitely carved in quarter sawed English oak by the renowned artist, John Kirchmayor of Oberammegau, Germany. The church’s early parishioners included many well known in local history. Most of them now lie in the hilly, wooded eleven acre churchyard behind the church. It is also the final resting place of the Rt. Rev. Abram Littlejohn, the first Episcopal Bishop of Long Island. The specimen trees and rare plantings in the churchyard came from the estates and greenhouses of the parishioners.

By 1900, the rectory and a parish house connected by cloisters had been added. In 1934, the Barstows gave the money to build an additional parish house to provide classrooms, a large auditorium, a pipe organ, a modern kitchen, a boiler room and a heating plant.

Recently, the cloisters were restored and most of the old parish house was remodeled. Three elegant large rooms were designed to be used for meetings and receptions. They were dedicated to Father Gary E, Maier, the fourth rector.

RECTORS

The Rev. Louis DeCormis 1887-1896
The Rev. Kirkland Huske 1896-1929
The Rev. Alexander R. McKechnie 1929-1965
The Rev. Gary E. Maier 1965-1997
The Rev. Christopher Connell 1999-2002
The Rev. Mauricio J. Wilson 2003- 2009

MISSIONERS

The Rev. Deacon Constance Lorenz 2010 - present
The Rev. Charles McCarron 2010 - present
The Rev. Joseph Pae 2010 - present