Leaders
Staff & Volunteers
Sam DeSocio, Pastor – Sam, his wife Jo and their two boys live in a 13′ wide row house in Lawrenceville, and it is an adventure! While Sam didn’t grow up in Pittsburgh, he has lived in Western PA for over a decade, and considers it home. Sam is a graduate of the Reformed Presbyterian Theological Seminary. Before starting Grace & Peace, Sam served at two churches in the Pittsburgh Area, City Reformed Church in Oakland, and Covenant Fellowship Church in Wilkinsburg. You can find out more about Sam here, and email him here.
Jesse Gidley, Worship Coordinator - Jesse is a Western Pennsylvania boy. He is a graduate of Carnegie Mellon University and works for Lami Grubb Architects. Jesse helps shape the style of our music, as well as coordinates all the organization surrounding our worship team.You can email Jesse here.
Emily Ruby & Joanna DeSocio, Children’s Ministry Coordinators – Emily is also from Western P.A., and works as a curator at the Heinz History Museum. Joanna moved to Pittsburgh for college, where she met Sam. She has run her own cleaning business, and has taught High School Spanish, but now is a full time mom, caring for Augustine and Gabriel. Emily and Joanna make sure that the kids of Grace & Peace are safe, loved, and encouraged, during our gathering times. You can email Emily here, and Joanna here.
Erika Gatz, Volunteer Coordinator – Erika is also a graduate of Geneva College, and has trained as a Photo-journalist. You can find her professional site here. As a church plant, using rented space, Erika oversees our weekly setup and tear down and helps schedule all our volunteers. She is also a regular part of our worship team. You can email Erika here.
Our Elder Team
Grace & Peace is part of the Presbyterian tradition. We believe that churches are like people, they need to be in deep community with each other, and they need accountability in their lives in order to be healthy. To foster this community and accountability we are connected with other churches in our region (called a Presbytery). On the local level each church is cared for by a dedicated group of local leaders (called elders). The qualifications for an elder can be found in 1 Timothy 3:1-6, and Titus 1:5-9.
As a church plant we do not yet have our own elder team, but because of our connectivity we have been able to borrow elders from other churches. Some of these elders work full-time teaching in the church (they are called teaching elders), others work in different fields and volunteer their time in church (they are called ruling elders).