Editor's Note: Names of seafarers changed for their safety and privacy. Gabriel has worked at Anchor House for 3 years. The information from this article is a mixture of interviews and his personal experience on the job.
People can see the sign outside of Anchor House from the road. Photo was taken in the summer of 2024. The sign and letters are the original art brought in in 1995 by a volunteer. Photo courtesy of Luke Evangelista
Anchor House, a ministry based out of Palmetto, Florida, seeks to fulfill the Great Commission in an unexpected way: Meeting the nations who are already at their backdoor through maritime ministry.
Maritime ministry seeks to do missions work by visiting the international seafarers who come to their local ports. They provide services such as transport and spiritual relief, access to resources and most importantly, relationships with those onboard, getting to understand their stories.
For Capt. Maksym, a normal nine-to-five job is out of the question. The voyage across the Gulf of Mexico requires attention at all times, and the ship is scheduled to make the journey in less than two days, traveling back and forth between Tuxpan, Mexico, and Port Manatee, Florida. At 3 a.m., the ship is scheduled to berth.
He sits in the bridge, the uppermost part of the ship, where he is surrounded by an array of computers, radios and sonars. His captain’s uniform, ornamented with black and gold epaulets, matches his stoic demeanor while working. He does his job with precision, making small adjustments to the course, one hand steady on the controls and the other holding a small mug filled with espresso.
Once the ship is at berth, he will take a quick rest, only to wake up a few hours later to get back to work. He is in charge of 20 crewmembers and has administrative oversight over the navigational equipment, cargo holds, engine and everyday affairs of the ship.
The crew looks to him as the bulwark of their ship, and Maksym goes through his day, constantly signing off on inspections and meeting with the Coast Guard and Customs agents.
He is a man who must be certain in every action he takes.
But the job provides uncertainties that Maksym has less control of. He is from Ukraine, and while on contract in 2021, his home in Mariupol, Ukraine, was destroyed by rockets during the Russian invasion. He subsequently moved his family to Poland, where they are still living. For four months at a time, Maksym is apart from home, from his culture and from his family who are living in a foreign country.
The UN Conference on Trade and Development 2021 reports that Ukraine provides the fifth most seafarers in the world. There are hundreds of seafarers who, like Maksym, have been displaced from their homes and forced to leave their countries. Many were put out of contact with their families for weeks or months at a time.
While they are on these ships, away from everything they know, the needs of seafarers remain, and there must be individuals who are willing to make them their focus—to counsel them, to pray with them, to talk with them, to meet them where they are and to provide relief in whatever way is possible. This is the call of maritime ministry.
One row of shipping containers sits at SeaPort Manatee, FL where they will be loaded on the back of semi trucks. Photo from the summer of 2024. These are refrigerated containers meant to hold fruit and juices to be brought to grocery stores and suppliers. Photo courtesy of Luke Evangelista
To the Nations
Maritime ministry dates back to the 1800s and retains a strong network of organizations and individuals across the globe, according to the North American Maritime Ministry Association. Despite this fact, the importance and visibility of these kinds of ministries in the general public continues to go unseen.
Operating off of the southern end of the Tampa Bay, Anchor House’s mission is to meet “the spiritual, emotional and physical needs of all international seafarers and the local SeaPort Manatee Community,” according to their website.
The ministry started in 1985, when Jim George, a retired ship captain and believer, noticed there was no outlet for spiritual hospitality or discipleship on the port, according to the Anchor House website. He began working out of the back of his van, visiting the ships that would come in, bringing them baked goods, praying for them and handing out Bibles.
The ministry existed in this setting for four years until 1989, when Anchor House opened the doors of its center — the same center which exists today, according to their website. Since then, the ministry has partnered with SeaPort Manatee to best serve the greater community with a multi-faceted ministry.
“Anchor House provides a place that fosters fellowship and community while also providing spiritual resources to people who might not otherwise have access to them,” said Luke Evangelista, the summer intern through the North American Maritime Ministry Association (NAMMA).
Anchor House seeks to live up to this vision, serving everyone across the port community, according to their website. Their main task is visiting the international ships, providing services to the seafarers onboard.
Visitation consists of “going up to the vessel, meeting with the crew and captain and serving their needs by going to them,” according to Jeff Holton, the executive director of Anchor House. They conduct prayer and worship services, giving seafarers a chance to worship while away from home.
Two Filipino seafarers wave from the top of their ship while on a break at SeaPort Manatee, FL during the winter of 2023. Photo was taken from the Anchor House van to pick up seafarers. Photo courtesy of Luke Evangelista
“We meet with the officers from a ship and work around their schedule to do a worship service. It is a time of fellowship, of worship and of good food,” said Jeff Holton.
On the other end of the spectrum, Anchor House runs an on-site convenience store and restaurant that is available to the local port workers. These are the workers who move cargo from the ship to the storage sheds where they are brought to the city.
The local port workers are also involved with the administrative side of the port as members of the Propellor Club, a group devoted to the exposure of the maritime industry in the community, according to their website.
Anchor House is also present at most port events, often giving an invocation or prayer. They are not just chaplains to seafarers but to the whole port community.
“I see seafaring ministry as being part of a broader supply chain ministry,” Evangelista said. “Historically, the goal has been to reach the full spectrum, from the seafarers to the truckers. We are physically available to all of them. We make ourselves available to a wide scope of people in the supply chain process. We sit in the middle of a grand ‘baton pass.’”
Why Seafarers?
Seafarers, sometimes called mariners, are the heartbeat of the marine industry. The term can be used to describe anyone who works on an ocean vessel, ranging from cruise and cargo ship workers to commercial fishermen to members of the navy or coast guard.
Anchor House specifically addresses the needs of international cargo ship workers. These are individuals who are usually onboard the ships for months at a time, with lower ranking crew members onboard anywhere from 6 to 10 months at a time.
Seafarers are often overlooked and can feel invisible to the world around them. Many maritime ministry organizations use the colloquial term “Sea blindness” to describe the divide between life on land and the behemoth, known as the shipping industry.
“For most of us, the sea is simply a place we fly over, a broad canvas of darker and lighter blues,” David Urbina, an investigative journalist for the New York Times wrote in his book “The Outlaw Ocean,” an exposé of the dangers of working at sea.
To visualize the problem of sea blindness more clearly, look at the room you are sitting in. There might be tables, chairs and a TV. More than likely, you are reading this on a phone or computer. Would it be surprising to know that the parts to make these items — if not the items themselves — were likely, at one point, brought here by cargo ships?
A Filipino seafarer enters the Anchor House van for transport into town in Palmetto, FL. Taken in Palmetto, FL. One of the ministry’s great privileges is to offer transport and build relationships with the seafarers in the van. Photo courtesy of Luke Evangelista.
“Over 80% of the volume of international trade in goods is carried by sea, and the percentage is even higher for most developing countries,” According to the Review of Maritime Transport 2021, a report by a division of the UN which specializes in global trade and shipping,
“Americans see ports just as a wall that separates the sea from the land. I feel like we are invisible here,” José, a seafarer from Cádiz, Spain, said. “In Cádiz, people know what seafarers are, who we are. It’s like, ‘Oh you’re a seafarer?’ It’s seen as a career to strive towards.”
Seafarers Welfare
Anchor House’s ministry conducts within three spheres of care: the physical, emotional and spiritual. The ministry subscribes to a holistic view of the individual.
When Anchor House engages in ministry, they want to serve the whole person—not the physical or spiritual alone but all aspects of that person. Serving just one of these needs often opens the door for one of the other needs to be met. It’s all about the relationships formed.
The physical needs are the ones Anchor House attends to on a daily basis.
Most of the ministry’s day is taken up by ship visitation and the transportation service they provide.
Anchor House is a ministry that is practical but overlooked as a service that seafarers might need. Seafarers are able to shop when they go to town so that they can get provisions, items for personal use and other upgrades they can give for the ships.
During COVID-19, between 2020 and 2021, Anchor House was part of a larger initiative to provide seafarers access to vaccinations. Partnering with local clinics and pharmacies, maritime ministries across the country supplied access to vaccinations to ease the stress and uncertainty in a time that was uncertain for everyone.
Over 100,000 vaccines were administered in North America alone, according to a report by Dr. David Lucas. Being vaccinated ensured that seafarers would stay safe and be able to continue working on the ship.
While out at sea, seafarers do not usually have Wi-Fi, so Anchor House also provides hotspots without charge for them, giving many seafarers an opportunity to call their families back home or to wind-down after a long day of work.
Anchor House also provided service to the crew of the Dali ship in Baltimore, which recently crashed and was stuck in harbor, a case that was followed by the BBC. Anchor House sent up multiple hotspots to the crew in order that they might be able to have access to Wi-Fi, and the crew sent a letter in gratitude.
"These hotspots have been indispensable to the crew,” Josh, one of the crewmembers, wrote. “I cannot thank you enough for this!”
It is in these simple gestures that Anchor House is able to provide physical services — not only as a means to give the crew members access to something they might not have before — but also as an embodiment of grace and charity so others might see Christ through their actions.
In the past, data on seafarer’s mental and emotional welfare has not been well recorded. It is now becoming an emphasis of the industry to take note of this unseen and often overlooked danger that seafarers face.
More than 25% of seafarers reported experiencing depression and depressive symptoms, according to “Happy Sailing: Improving the Mental Health of Seafarers,” a study done by Bernhard Schulte Ship Management.
When seafarers are onboard ships, they often experience isolation physically, emotionally and culturally, being cut off from their families and homes for months at a time.
Out of the hundreds of seafarers interviewed, almost 45% answered that they do not reach out to anybody when they are feeling depressed, according to a study by ITF Seafarers’ Trust and Yale University.
Emotional stress for seafarers also expands beyond the workplace. Like Maksym, many other seafarers may be experiencing tensions back home that are beyond their reach. Seafarers often miss their children’s first steps and words, or sometimes even their child’s birth.
The intersection of cultures can be another emotional stressor for seafarers. The working language onboard the ships is commonly English, but it is rarely a crew member’s first language.
A kind of cultural isolation is common, as there are ships where the shared first language of the crew will be shared by all but one crewmember.
There are also ships in which ethnic or political tensions form between crewmembers. For example, many ships have both Russian and Ukrainian crewmembers working on the same vessel. The tension of the situation is real for both crewmembers, yet they must find a way to live with each other for months on end.
Fully aware of these tensions onboard, Anchor House strives to bring the reconciliation of the Gospel to ships. They provide access to resources, such as Happy@Sea, a free counseling and wellbeing service for seafarers.
Some tensions are impossible to ignore onboard a ship, but there are also moments of beautiful reconciliation and sanctification of individuals, empowered by the spirit of the Gospel.
One of Anchor House’s chaplains gets ready to do a visit on a juice ship in Port Manatee, FL. This ship goes back and forth from Brazil to SeaPort Manatee once a month. Photo courtesy of Luke Evangelista.
Spiritual
“Religion is not something we have and seafarers lack,” according to a course by NAMMA through MARE training.
This idea is important to remember when engaging in ministry with seafarers, discipleship and relationships are going to have their own challenges that may look different than other ministries.
For seafarers, overcoming this challenge often looks like forming genuine relationships. It goes beyond evangelism, and it resides in continuing the work of discipleship, praying with them and continuing to provide for physical and emotional needs while engaging with their spiritual ones.
“Anchor House is a wellspring in a desert,” said Doug Addson, one of the ministry’s weekly volunteers. “We get to share the light of Christ with those who might otherwise never get to hear it. It’s an avenue to the lost. I get to be a part of the avenue to reach people, and I can do that by doing something simple like cooking a meal or visiting a ship.”
The history of maritime spiritual care predates Anchor House, dating back to 1835, when John Ashley, an Anglican priest, was walking with his son along the Bristol Channel, according to the Mission to Seafarers website.
According to legend, Ashley’s son saw the ships and asked his father a simple question: “How do seafarers go to church when they are working on ships?”
And so, Ashley created “The Mission to Seafarers”. Since their conception, The Mission to Seafarers have sought to create relationships with seafarers, “providing help and support to the 1.89 million crewmen and women who face danger every day to keep our global economy afloat,” according to their website.
“Our mandate is not to have a coercive disposition to other people,” said Evangelista about spiritual interactions while onboard ships. “We prioritize being gentle towards other worldviews. We want to both stand for truth while not being alienating or imposing.”
The maritime world often suggests a separation between itself and religion, according to a MARE training course entitled “Seafaring as a Sacred way of Life”. The work of maritime chaplaincy, the union of these two worlds is emphasized.
For a seafarer, the ship is their home, their workplace and their place of leisure. There are often differing perspectives among the crewmembers, and Anchor House must take care to be conscious of these forces at play with one another.
Anchor House is inspired by the words of the Great Commission and reads Hebrews 6:19 as their cornerstone, according to their website: “We have this hope as an anchor for the soul, firm and secure. It enters the inner sanctuary behind the curtain.”
Anchor House seeks to be an oasis for seafarers, reaching the invisible workers who are the backbone of the economy and lifting up the work of those who brave the last untamed frontier.
Gabriel is a senior at Wheaton College, Illinois, studying English Writing and Biblical & Theological Studies. He is passionate about the writing process and being an advocate of truth through writing.
