Friday 28 October – 6.30pm for 7pm start.

$50 per head. Fully catered 2 course meal and all drinks inc. wine supplied.

Book by contacting the Registry 5331 1183. Pay over the phone in advance or on the night.

Guest Speaker: The Rev’d Debra Saffrey-Collins

About Debra Saffrey-Collins

Debra is the Head of Chaplaincy and Diocesan Partnerships at the Brotherhood of St Laurence (BSL), based in Melbourne, and is the first woman to head up the Brotherhood’s Chaplaincy team in its ninety-year history.

Debra has worked for Parishes, the Diocese of Melbourne Youth Department - AYM, and the Anglican Board of Mission - Australia (ABM), where she worked for 14 years in a variety of roles and with all of ABM’s Partners across the world, before moving to the BSL in 2008 originally as the Assistant Chaplain, before heading up the team in 2016. She has also served on many diocesan, state, national and international committees for the Anglican Communion. In 2012 she was invited back to ABM to join the Board of Directors for ABM, completing her second term in 2018.

Debra is currently a member of the Committee of Management for the Diocese of Melbourne’s Prevention of Violence Against Women Program, the Diocesan Church Growth Committee, the Diocesan Parish Partnership Committee and the BSL Ethics Committee. She also supervises theological students and Curates through placement at the BSL. In 2020 after much soul searching and discernment, she offered for Ordination and was accepted by the Archbishop of Melbourne at the end of that year. Debra was ordained as a deacon in February 2021 and as a priest in November last year. Her Ministry is fulltime at the Brotherhood of St Laurence and as an Honorary Assistant Curate in the Parish of Gisborne with its three centres at Gisborne, Riddells Creek and Macedon.

Debra is married to Brett, and they have two children - Joshua 23 and Angus who has just turned 18 (and is imminently coming to the end of his secondary schooling). They have two much loved dogs - Ruby a 10-year-old Schnauzer, and Hugo a very naughty eight month old Airedale Terrier. They feel blessed to live in the beautiful Macedon Ranges.

(PICTURE ABOVE Melanesian Brothers in the Torres Strait ©Diocese of North Queensland)