Listen to Mary Anne de la Torre’s story: “A Deeper Level of Coming Home” from the We Are Vineyard podcast.
Mary Anne de la Torre was born in the Philippines and immigrated to NJ when she was almost 7 years old. After attending college in Pennsylvania, she began her teaching career but was quickly called into ministry.
Mary Anne serves as the Senior Associate/NextGen Pastor at North Jersey Vineyard. She oversees the Children’s and Youth Ministries and also supervises some staff members and serves on the Executive Leadership Team. Mary Anne also joyfully serves with the AAPI and Women’s Associations.
Mary Anne and her husband Rich have two kids, Marcus and Noemi. She loves to travel, spend time with her family, and works part-time as a donut connoisseur. She tries to run to offset all the donuts in her spare time.
I’m excited for the work that the associations have already done in championing underrepresented voices, it definitely feels like a new day. I’m excited for the work to continue and for more AAPI voices to be highlighted and welcomed to tables of leadership and decision-making. I’m excited for more support and networks amongst AAPI leaders and pastors in the Vineyard so that the entire Vineyard family may be strengthened and blessed through what AAPI leaders and pastors are able to bring to the table. Finally, it’s exciting to develop friendships with other AAPI leaders and pastors across the country—there are more of us than I thought and that’s an exciting discovery!
My dream for the association would be that we would be instrumental in identifying and raising up more AAPI leaders in the Vineyard. Through the association’s work, I hope that AAPI leaders and pastors would be supported, encouraged, and equipped to do all that God has called them to. I pray that our association would be a safe and healing place for all AAPIs in the Vineyard where we would be able to, with specificity and understanding, minister to one another and encouraged to bring our full selves to our respective places of ministry. May it even be a safe place to dream for more for ourselves and one another.
I love the Vineyard because I have found a more expansive spiritual home. I have experienced so much more freedom in Christ than I thought was possible. I have been able to experience the Holy Spirit in profound and intimate ways. I have been cared for and have grown in my skills as a leader and as a pastor. And, most recently and excitedly. with the formation of the Associations, I have loved being invited to grow and explore and actually bring ALL of who I am, including my being Asian American Pacific Islander, to the table of leadership. It has felt like a more full welcome into the Vineyard family.
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