Staff

Philip Mayer grew up as a devout Pentecostal and developed a personal relationship with the Lord Jesus Christ and a love of the Bible at a young age. During college, in response to a calling to ordained ministry, he began studying theology and Christian history, which led to searching for the denomination that held the fullness of what he was discovering. He got married to an adventurous woman and found himself drawn to the rich liturgical traditions, history, and warmth that he discovered in the Episcopal Church and went on to be ordained.  

However, his studies into the Fathers of the Church and the development of doctrine led him to the Catholic faith. It was then that he discovered the Lord’s foundation of the Church was in Catholicism and that the fullness and true flourishing of the faith was still to be found. He entered the Church in 2012 along with his wife, and after receiving a special dispensation from Pope Francis, was ordained as a Catholic priest in 2019 and sent to Jacksonville to assist in fostering the growth and establishment of the mission of Saint James Catholic Church. Father Mayer offices out of Assumption Catholic Church where he can often be found celebrating the 6:30 AM Daily Mass. He also works as a chaplain for Promedica Hospice. 

Currently serving as a senior priest of the diocese of St. Augustine, Fr. Jim is fun loving and enjoys sharing his gift of gab and traveling around the world, including staying in Nova Scotia for most of the fall and winter season. He originally studied for the priesthood with the Jesuit Fathers in New Orleans and then served in the Florida National Guard. He was ordained as a priest for the Diocese of St. Augustine in 1980 and served for most of his career as a National Guard chaplain, though he was also assigned to a number of parishes for a short time.

Al has been a parishioner at St. James since it moved to Jacksonville in 2019 and enjoys directing the St. James Schola. He studied music at Rhode Island College and the University of Massachusetts Amherst, completed an M.A. in Counseling from Franciscan University of Steubenville, where met his wife, and has been in private practice for the last twenty years. He is an active long-distance cyclist and loves to read, hike, go to the beach, attend symphony concerts, and hang out with friends and colleagues. He has been happily married for over twenty years to his wife and best friend, Diane, who is also a parishioner at St. James. 

Jeremy Dobbs has been working steadily as a choir director and/or organist since discerning out of seminary in 2001. He served as music director at a Catholic school in Minnesota and for a Fatima apostolate outside Buffalo. He has been at work at one or more Latin Masses since moving to Jacksonville in 2007. He has been happily married to Rachel since 2008. For fun, he plays bass in a band and has a music review show on YouTube: The Classic Rock Beagle.

Christine serves as the Director of the parish’s Religious Education Program. From an early age, her love of children shaped her life as she ended up pursuing a Masters of Elementary Education from the University of Florida. She has been involved in children’s ministry for many years around the diocese, always striving to bring kids closer to Jesus through love of others!

Christine met her future husband at her high school youth group. Being high school and college sweethearts led to marriage and four beautiful children aged 5 to 12. When not spending time with her family, you can find Christine snuggled up to her Kindle, singing along to her favorite songs, or doing 100 loads of laundry. She lives her life by St. Mother Teresa’s words, “I alone cannot change the world, but I can cast a stone across the water and create many ripples.”

John is from Mobile, Alabama, retired from the Marine Corps and State of Florida. He is married to Ana Brown and has two children and two grandchildren. He enjoys gardening, fishing and traveling.  While in the Military John met his wife Ana in Spain while stationed throughout Europe, to which he hopes to return one day to complete the Camino de Santiago. John has a passion to help and lend a hand has been blessed to find and grow in his faith through the Personal Ordinariate of the Chair of St. Peter. When not traveling he and Ana enjoy meeting with friends and engaging in meaningful discussion.

Carol accepted Jesus as a young adult and attended Evangelical churches until the 1986 when she became a High Church Episcopalian. In 2011 she and her husband were received in the Catholic Church at Our Lady of Hope in Kansas City, an Anglican Use Catholic Community which joined the Ordinariate when it first began. They moved to St. Johns County in 2019 to be nearer to family and have been active at St. James since its beginning in Jacksonville.

Carol was born in New York City, but has since lived in Louisiana, Michigan, Kansas, and now Florida. She has BA degrees in Psychology and Music, played String Bass in orchestras and jazz bands, and served as a Suzuki method piano teacher for over 40 years, and sang in church choir for 20 years, including performing several Gilbert and Sullivan choruses. She and Jim have been married for 55 years and have two daughters and three granddaughters. She has traveled to 80 countries and all 7 continents. Both she and Jim are cancer survivors.