Rev. Ashley Cook

Years ago, the Rev. Ashley Cook formed her ministry vision from a charge to priests detailed in the Ordination service in The Book of Common Prayer of The Episcopal Church. Through it, the Holy Spirit continues to speak to her to this day on the mission and character of her Episcopal priesthood:

“In all that you do, you are to nourish Christ’s people from the riches of his grace, and strengthen them to glorify God in this life and in the life to come.”

Rev. Ashley followed a call into ordained life in 2011, after joining St. Cyprian’s and The Episcopal Church in 2002. She left St. Cyprian’s more than a dozen years ago to serve missions, missional communities, and parishes in the Northeast and Southeast Convocations. In July 2025, she began serving as supply priest at St. Cyprian’s, before accepting the call as Interim Pastoral Associate with us beginning in October 2025.

Now headed into her 15th year as clergy, Rev. Ashley’s ministry has included initiating connection for community partnerships, revitalizing churches and church schools, and planting and developing missional communities serving university students and marginalized populations via in-person, hybrid, and fully online formats. Most recently, she was serving as supply priest to three small churches.

Rev. Ashley has more than two decades’ service on non-profit community boards, community advisory boards, Diocesan committees, and church and church school boards in executive and general membership. Her professional work and volunteerism include a total of 25+ years in journalism, medical chaplaincy, community education, child advocacy, and service among people experiencing homelessness, hunger, illiteracy, poverty, violence, and inequity. Rev. Ashley is a highly experienced instructor, facilitator, presenter, and media spokeswoman in local and national arenas, equipping thousands of East Texans and hundreds of agency, church, and community non-profit partners across the country with the tools to help create and sustain just and healthy outcomes for at-risk children and families in community.

Rev. Ashley graduated in the top percent of her class with a Bachelor of Science in Journalism at Stephen F. Austin State University in 2004. She went on to graduate from The Iona School for Ministry in 2011 and 2014. She and her husband, Steve, have been married 35 years and have two adult children. Rev. Ashley enjoys thrifting, projects around their 1945 cottage, and exploring the spirituality of writing about the intersection of faith and modern issues.