Congregational Vitality

Canon Catherine Massey

Canon Massey graduated from Virginia Commonwealth University with a degree in Mass Communications and has over 15 years of experience in sales, marketing and association management. Prior to working at Diocesan House, she served as parish life coordinator for St. John's, Wake Forest.

Canon Massey works with the congregational development team and the office of transition ministry, and she supports congregations and clergy in transition. She also helps support our diocesan staff, the Safe Church program, and the work of the Commission on Ministry, the Pastoral Response Team and the Disciplinary Board.

Canon Massey enjoys learning how people and organizations work together and says it is an honor and a privilege to serve the clergy and churches in our diocese.

Canon Massey is a native of Richmond, Virginia, and has lived in North Carolina with her family for 20 years. She and her husband, Robert, have three young adult daughters and two Scottish terriers. The Masseys live in Wake Forest and are members of Christ Church, Raleigh.

Joy Shillingsburg

Joy Shillingsburg is a lifelong educator who served as the director of youth and outreach at St. John’s, Wake Forest, for more than a decade before joining diocesan staff. Prior to serving at St. John’s, Joy spent 15 years as a classroom history teacher outside of Philadelphia and in the Wake County Public School System. Her commitment to teaching historical truths and how these truths have the power to liberate and transform our lives and society has been a through line of her work. At St. John’s, Joy led vibrant intergenerational programs that linked formation rooted in Becoming Beloved Community to vibrant outreach ministries. As an extension of her work as director of youth and outreach, Joy founded Wake Forest Community Table. This thriving nonprofit served more than 25,000 meals from 2020 through 2022 while connecting diverse members of the community to each other through quarterly gatherings that explore the history, laws, personal stories, and systems that necessitate the twice-weekly meal distribution.

Joy lives her faith by serving her neighbors and is deeply committed to leading diverse stakeholders to do the work of Becoming Beloved Community. Joy earned her M.S. in History Education at Villanova University. She lives with her family in Wake Forest. Joy loves biking, hiking, traveling, and podcasts almost as much as reading!

The Rev. Earnest Graham

Canon Graham serves as a regional canon located in the Greensboro and Winston-Salem convocations.

Prior to attending seminary, Canon Graham worked as a graphic artist in advertising as well as an illustrator. He comes to the Diocese from the Episcopal Diocese of Southern Virginia where he served as interim rector of Hickory Neck Episcopal Church in Toano, Virginia, and rector of St. Matthew's in Chesterfield, Virginia.

Ordained in 2001, Canon Graham’s service to the church began long before he entered Virginia Theological Seminary. While a lay member at St. Mark’s Episcopal Church in Casper, Wyoming, he chaired committees and directed ministries, he led youth programs and served as a vestry member, acolyte, LEM and hospital visitor. His call deepened, leading him to VTS in 1998; he remained in Virginia following his ordination.

In his free time, Canon Graham continues to practice art, creating comic book translations of the Bible; he is currently at work on selections of the Psalms.

The Rev. Kathy Walker

The Rev. Kathy Walker previously served as the associate rector for pastoral care and parish life at St. John’s Episcopal Church in Tallahassee, Florida, though her call to church leadership and ministry is one she has answered her entire life. Prior to becoming a member of the clergy, over her lifetime she has served as a licensed lay reader, a lay Eucharistic minister, vestry member and church officer. She was instrumental in the founding of the David Henry Brooks chapter of Union of Black Episcopalians in the Diocese of Florida, and while serving as its president organized multiple forums about the future of Black churches.

Kathy believes strongly in the honoring and continuity of Black churches and hopes in her new role to help as many as possible not only survive, but flourish. She also wants to work with congregations to deepen their churches’ roots in the communities they already serve so well, and build leadership opportunities in the Church for future generations.

The Rev. Canon Lindsey Ardrey

The Rev. Lindsey Ardrey lives in Durham, but before landing in North Carolina, Lindsey served as a children’s and youth minister, school chaplain, and co-chair for the Racial Reconciliation Commission in the Diocese of Louisiana. A deep believer in healing as a vital medium for issues stemming from race, Lindsey brings this perspective into every conversation and space she occupies, whether it’s on the parish or The Episcopal Church level. Creativity, artistic expressions, and practices of embodiment infuse her approach to this work.

Lindsey is a lover of books, plants, hot tea, and manifesting dreams her ancestors didn’t know they had. She is a writer, an auntie, a serious seeker of rest, a godparent, and a human in deep need of laughter and silence in equal measure.

The Rev. Canon Franklin Morales

Franklin Morales is a native of Venezuela. He's married to Dr. Yenny Morales, and they have an almost six-year-old girl called Sarah.

Franklin is a former Roman Catholic priest within the Discalced Carmelites Order. He went to seminary in Venezuela, Central America, and Europe. After being in the priesthood for four years, Franklin changed to another Christian denomination, starting his discernment process within the ELCA (Evangelical Lutheran Church in America), where he was received as an ordained minister. He also served as an associate pastor in a congregation in the Washington, D.C., metropolitan area and an Episcopal congregation.

Serving within the Episcopal Diocese of North Carolina is a blessing for Franklin and his family. They hope and pray that we may grow together as a Body of Christ, bringing the Gospel to those in need, and, at the same time, continuing to build the Beloved Community Jesus asked us to create.

Franklin is eager, as the canon missioner for Latino/Hispanic ministry, to learn and create spaces where diversity and inclusion are beyond words and can be incarnate in the daily life of our diocese.

The Rev. Marion Sprott