St. Francis House seeks to be a welcoming place for all people to come together in Christ, to claim their ministries and create community. Whoever you are, and wherever you find yourself on your journey of faith, you are welcome here. Educational series are offered every semester.

We hope you will think of St. Francis House as your home away from home.  We strongly encourage you to use the lounges during the day and the chapel is open for prayer every weekday as well. This means that you can come and study here between classes, watch TV in the lounge, cook in the kitchen, host a BBQ in the backyard.

In light of this, there are some fundamental expectations about any home that is shared by a community. If you need to schedule any event, such as a class or a formal meeting, you need to check with Jill Kelly, the administrator to reserve the space and to get an orientation to the building. Other groups do use the building and pay a fee to do so, so you need to be sure your plans are coordinated with the house.

Residency

St. Francis House is a wonderful living community that is located on University Avenue in the heart of campus. If you are interested in living here, please email us and we will send you an application. You can also find our more about living here by going to our Residency page.

Dinners

Scripture says that humanity can not live on bread alone, but by the living Word of God. We like to eat bread in the liturgy and afterwards. All are welcome to the dinners downstairs each week that are prepared by students or by different Madison Episcopal Churches. These people are looking forward to meeting you and welcoming you to the University and the community. We also cook our own meals and hope that you will share your culinary skills with us by signing up for a cooking night once this semester. Come join us!

Football Parking

Football parking is our biggest fundraiser for the year. The money we raise from football parking will go into our food and program budget. The more cars we park the more food we can eat and the more activites we can do together! Your presence at parking will be a wonderful way to offer stewardship of your time so we can be good stewards of our resources. Contact Scott Miller to sign up.

The Alms Basin

You will notice that we do not pass the plate during the course of our service. However, we do leave an alms basin at the back of the church for your gifts to the campus ministry. We run primarily on an endowment, but over the past few years the endowment has not been able to cover the cost of our annual budget. We need to raise about $40,000 annually to break even. We are working on that on all ends. Stewardship is time and money, and for most students, time is the primary contribution. We do encourage you to consider giving a financial gift each semester.

Chaplain

A chaplain is someone directly appointed by a bishop who serves in a non-parochial setting. Episcopal Campus Ministry is non-parochial because we are not supported by our pledges and because we function on the school calendar as opposed to the parochial calendar. A chaplain is usually ordained. In my case, I am a priest who is serving as a chaplain. In practical terms, I am a pastor, a preacher, a priest, a teacher, administrator, and a coffee and tea drinker. Please feel free to reach me by email and/or phone. I hope to meet each one of you individually at some point. My email is stfrancischaplain@yahoo.com or 257-0688.