A New Call for Matt Dayton-Welch ’15

The Rev. Matthew Dayton-Welch, Class of 2015, has been called as the 18th rector at The Church of the Epiphany in New York City. Dayton-Welch currently serves as rector of St. Alban’s Episcopal Church in Newtown Square, Pennsylvania, a post he has held since 2017. He has presided over a season of great growth at St. Alban’s as their membership tripled, programs expanded, and the campus underwent a once-in-a-generation property overhaul.  

Dayton-Welch previously served as associate rector at St. David’s Episcopal Church in Radnor, Pennsylvania, and as deacon at Christ Church in Short Hills, New Jersey. Originally from Oklahoma, he has extensive experience in the Middle East, having received his calling to ordained ministry while serving at the U.S. Consulate General in Jerusalem, where he worked closely with Jewish, Christian, and Islamic leaders and human rights advocates, and where he served as a guide for many visiting American congressional delegations.

Dayton-Welch also serves as the Episcopal Diocese of Pennsylvania's Canon for the Holy Land, organizing the covenant relationship between that diocese and the Diocese of Jerusalem through pilgrimage, study programs and common prayer, and fundraising. He is a trustee of the Spafford Children's Center in the Old City of Jerusalem, which provides trauma therapy and tutoring for disenfranchised children and empowerment programs for women, and he leads its American fundraising project.

Dayton-Welch is a proud citizen of the Cherokee Nation. He and his husband Paul, a CPA, will relocate to New York City with their dog Juniper.