Our Team
President and Lead Missionary
Married to his wife Cheryl since 1977, Reverend Rob Schenck (pronounced SHANK) is President and lead missionary of Faith and Action, a Christian outreach to elected and appointed officials in Washington, DC. As a highly sought after cultural observer, Rev. Schenck uses exceptional story-telling ability, powerful public-speaking skills and a remarkable sense of humor to provide profound insights into the challenging moral issues that confront our nation.
His candid and personal views on Capitol Hill activities have put him at the center of many Washington news conferences and he is often a guest on TV and radio shows from coast to coast including the Sean Hannity Show, On the Record with Greta Van Susteren and Larry King Live. Magazines including Life, Time, Newsweek, U.S. News & World Report and Christianity Today have all carried reports of his evangelistic efforts. Rev. Schenck has also been the focus of feature stories in the New York Times, the Chicago Tribune, the Houston Chronicle and the Los Angeles Times. His biography in the Baltimore Sun was one of the largest features ever published in that newspaper and The Washington Post printed a front-page article about his views on homosexuality. Dr. Schenck has met and spoken personally with two Presidents, former and current Speakers of the House, Senate Majority Leaders, numerous members of Congress and all nine Justices of the US Supreme Court.
Rev. Schenck is president of the National Clergy Council, a network of pastors and denominational leaders who work together to bring Christian moral principles into the conversation and debate surrounding national policy, and currently serves as the chairman of the Evangelical Church Alliance. He also serves on the boards of the Capitol Hill Executive Service Club, the Institute on Religion and Public Policy, and the Methodist Episcopal Church.
Through his work with the Institute on Religion and Public Policy, Rob has also traveled extensively overseas, including nations such as Morocco and the Sudan, working tirelessly to uphold the dignity of life and safeguard religious freedom as the fundamental human freedom.
He holds ministerial affiliation with both the Evangelical Church Alliance and the Methodist Episcopal Church.
Chief of Program
Peggy Nienaber currently serves as the Chief of Program for Faith and Action in the Nation’s Capital, overseeing the ministry’s program and events that focus on building strong alliances on Capitol Hill. Peggy also serves as President of the Capitol Hill Executive Service Club, a club of executives that have net weekly in the US Capitol for over 40+ years.
Supporter Relations Specialist
Patty Bills serves as Supporter Relations Coordinator for Faith and Action in the Nation’s Capitol. Patty is a graduate from George Mason University, where she was a key member in helping develop the largest Christian Fellowship Group during the 1980’s.
Prior to Faith and Action, Patty served as an elected officer for the Canton Chamber of Commerce for 12 years and was the recipient of the Canton Chamber of Commerce Years of Service Award. She also served as Vice President for the Continuity of Care for 22 years, the largest senior focus community service group.
With over 30 years of customer service background, Patty oversees advocates for FAA as well as supporting churches. Patty takes personal interest in what matters to our supporters, prays with and for them, and provides our supporters opportunities for service to Faith and Action thru being personal involvement and giving.
Patty currently lives in Nokesville, VA and has been married to William Bills for 24 years. They have a son, Jesse.
Associate Missionaries
Rev. Pat Mahoney (left) and Rev. Rob Schenck (right) performing the Stations of the Cross on Capitol Hill
A long time ally of Faith and Action, Rev. Pat Mahoney is the President of the Christian Defense Coalition.
Rev. Gary Dull serves as the Senior Pastor of Faith Baptist Church of Altoona, Pennsylvania. He often travels to Washington, DC to assist Faith and Action in many of our programs and outreaches to our national leaders.
Ministry Partnerships
Fr. Frank Pavone is one of the most prominent pro-life leaders in the world. Originally from New York, he was ordained in 1988 by Cardinal John O’Connor. He is a priest of the Amarillo Diocese and serves full-time in pro-life leadership with his bishop’s permission. In 1993 he became National Director of Priests for Life. He is also the President of the National Pro-life Religious Council, and the National Pastoral Director of the Silent No More Awareness Campaign and of Rachel’s Vineyard, the world’s largest ministry of healing after abortion. He travels throughout the country, to an average of four states every week, preaching and teaching against abortion. He produces programs regularly for religious and secular radio and television networks.
Tim Goeglein is the vice president for external relations at Focus on the Family and offices in our facility in Washington, DC. Prior to working with Focus on the Family, Goeglein served as special assistant to President George W. Bush, as the deputy director of the White House Office of Public Liaison. Tim’s life is a remarkable story of grace and redemption.
Goeglein graduated from Indiana University’s School of Journalism and is the author of “Man in the Middle.” He currently resides in the Washington-area with his wife and two sons.
County Corrections Gospel Mission
Jack Lawrence Krans is graduated from the Philadelphia College of Bible in 1972 with a degree in Bible Social Work. He also holds a Master’s in Divinity degree from Eastern Seminary in St David’s. He was appointed Chaplain of the Chester County Prison in 1973 and is Founder and Director of County Corrections Gospel Mission. He served as pastor of the Hephzibah Baptist Church in Coatesville and was responsible for starting the Coatesville street ministry, City Gate Mission.
Jack has received several awards for his work including the Social Work Award from the Philadelphia College of Bible.
Jack Crans is also Chaplain of the Pennsylvania State Police and serves as Honorary Chaplain of the Chester County Fraternal Order of Police.
Ruth Schofield is the founder of the award winning national television media, The Washington Report, featuring news from Capitol Hill. In 1995 Ruth developed the Embassy for World Peace in Washington, D.C. which serves to protect and defend religious freedom around the world. Ruth has been representing the Judeo-Christian community at the nation’s capital since 1985 and is an ordained minister with the Assemblies of God, Springfield, MO. serving in the Potomac District’s Capital Section.
Board of Trustees
Chairman of the Board
Paul Chaim Benedicta Schenck is a member of the Missionaries of the Gospel of Life and Founding Director of the National Pro-Life Center on Capitol Hill, located directly across from the United States Supreme Court.
Fr. Schenck was raised Jewish and attended Hebrew school in Niagara Falls, New York. He became a Christian and was baptized at age sixteen. He attended a Jewish Theological Institute, a missionary Bible College, an Evangelical Seminary, and a Catholic University. He was an ordained Anglican minister, chaplain to the Law Faculty at Regent University, Executive Vice-President of the American Center for Law and Justice, and founder of two parochial schools, a ministry to the homeless and a missionary relief organization. He and his family came to the Catholic Church in 2004.
Fr. Schenck holds degrees in the bible, theology and humanities, and possesses the Graduate Catechetical Diploma granted by the Vatican Congregation for the Clergy. He was given the Life Achievement Award by Franciscan University in Steubenville, Ohio and was awarded the Doctor of Humanities, (honoris causae), by the Thomas More College of Liberal Arts where he is a trustee. In 2009 he completed the certification program for the Pastoral Provision, which allows former Protestant clergy to be ordained Catholic priests. He was ordained to the transitional Diaconate by Bishop Martin Holley of Washington, DC on February 20, 2010. In June of 2010, he was ordained as a priest in the Diocese of Harrisburg, Pennsylvania.
Fr. Schenck has been interviewed on all major news networks, CBN and EWTN. He has appeared on Nightline with Ted Koppel, Larry King Live, the Leher News Hour, and ABC 20/20. He has also appeared on Court TV. He was featured in LIFE magazine, USA Today, Washington Times Magazine and World Magazine among many others. With attorney Stephen Peroutka, he is founder of National Pro-Life Radio.Net. In 2008 Bishop Kevin Rhoades appointed Fr. Schenck Director of the Respect Life Office for the Diocese of Harrisburg (PA), where he is also Director of the Office of Stewardship.
President
Rev. Rob (Robert L.) Schenck is co-founder and president of P & R Schenck, Associates in Evangelism, Inc., the parent corporation to Faith and Action in the Nation’s Capital, the National Clergy Council, and the National Pro-Life Center on Capitol Hill.
Rob is twin brother to Fr. Paul C.B. Schenck, who is co-founder and chair of the organization. P & R Schenck, Associates in Evangelism, Inc., is a New York non-profit, religious / charitable corporation registered to do business in the District of Columbia. It has been determined to be tax-exempt by the Internal Revenue Service.
Rob has is an ordained minister with dual affiliation in the Evangelical Church Alliance International (one of America’s oldest associations of independent clergy, executives of religious institutions, missionaries, and chaplains, both civilian and military) and the Methodist Episcopal Church USA, a conservative branch of Methodism that pre-dates the mergers resulting in the liberal United Methodist Church.
Rob holds a B.A. in Theology, Master of Arts in Christian Ministry, and a Doctor of Ministry (from Faith Evangelical Lutheran Seminary, Tacoma, Washington), and the Doctor of Divinity (honoris causa), conferred by St. Paul Christian University and the Joint Academic Commission of the National Clergy Council. He is presently a candidate for the Doctor of Ministry in Strategic Leadership from Faith Evangelical College and Seminary. His dissertation will be on the role of Dietrich Bonhoeffer as a philosopher-leader of the German church resistance to Adolf Hitler, Naziism, and the Third Reich.
Rob serves as president and chief executive officer of P & R Schenck, Associates in Evangelism, Inc, and Lead Missionary for Faith and Action in the Nation’s Capital. He was commissioned as a missionary to elected and appointed officials in the year 2000.
Trustees
Lt. Colonel David Hensey
David Hensey is a Lieutenant Colonel in the U.S. Marine Corps Reserves. He attended the University of Nevada Las Vegas and graduated with a Bachelor of Science degree with an emphasis in Accounting in 1988.
In 1990 he moved to Okinawa, Japan and joined 7th Communications Battalion located on Camp Hansen. In June 1994, he transferred to Marine Barracks, 8th & I, in Washington, D.C. where he met Reverend Rob Schenck, then pastor of the National Community Church on Capitol Hill. After a successful military tour in D.C., he decided to resign his commission in 1997 and return to his beloved home town, Las Vegas, Nevada.
After several years of missing the Corps, he joined the local Marine Corps Reserve unit and has served in the reserves from June 2000 to present. In 2003 and 2008, he was mobilized and deployed to Iraq in support of Operation Iraqi Freedom.
When David is not on active orders with the Marine Corps, he is an entrepreneur and an Independent Insurance agent, as well assisting his wife in building their health/fitness business as an Independent Team Beachbody Coach, marketing such products as P90X, Insanity, BodyGospel, Turbo Fire and the all natural drink, Shakeology.
David has been married to Paula for 23 years and they have four daughters, Angela, Gabrielle, Elisha and Diamond.
Rev. Dr. David Hernquist
David Hernquist was born in Olean, New York. After graduating from Olean High School in 1965, he attended SUNY Fredonia where he received his Bachelor of Music and Master of Music degrees. David began teaching instrumental music in public school in the Buffalo, New York area in 1973 and was also an aspiring clarinet player in symphony orchestras in the area.
In 1976, while still teaching school, he and his wife, Mary, began attending the Full Gospel Tabernacle in Orchard Park, New York pastored by Rev. Thomas F. Reid. Soon he began studying for the ministry. Pastor David was ordained with the Assemblies of God and became a full time assistant pastor at the Tabernacle in 1980. In 1989, he left the Tabernacle to travel full time with Rob Schenck and was involved extensively in missions in Mexico City and Pro-Life activism.
In 1990, Dave became senior pastor of Van Nest Assembly of God in the Bronx. Since 1990, Van Nest Assembly of God, a multicultural church, has grown to five services on Sundays, plus other services, prayer meetings and all kinds of ministries and activities during the week. Pastor David Hernquist is involved in serving outside his church such as in March For Jesus, Bronx National Day of Prayer, Bronx Clergy Task Force, Billy Graham Crusade, and many other clergy efforts in NYC.
Mr. Dick Jones
Mr. Dick Jones is an investments specialist with Folger, Nolan Fleming and Douglas, a leading Washinton, DC company. Dick is retired from the Marine Corps and helped lead the effort to build the Marine Corps Museum in Quantico, Virginia.
Mr. Jones has been a friend to the ministry of Faith and Action for a number of years and helped write the investments policy for the organization. He chairs both the finance and investment committees of Faith and Action.
Dick is also a member of the Capitol Hill Executive Service Committee, a group of public and civic leaders who meet regularly in the Mansfield Room of the US Capitol. Rob Schenck serves as Chaplain of that organization.
Rev. Dr. Harry Thomas
Dr. Harry L. Thomas, Jr., holds a Master of Divinity Degree from Eastern Baptist Theological Seminary and was awarded the Doctor of Humane Letters from the same institution. Dr. Thomas is the founder and executive director of Come Alive International, Inc. which sponors the annual Creation Festivals, attended each year by more than 100,000 youth.
Dr. Thomas received the Lifetime Achievement Award from the Gospel Music Association in 2004. He serves on the board of the Philadelphia Leadership Foundation, the Supreme Court Historical Society, the Fellowship of Religious Leaders, and the Christian Festivals Association.
Dr. Thomas also founded the “Friendship Fest” in Morocco in 2005 and 2006, where over 200,000 attended from the Muslim and Christian communities in Morocco. He also co-founded Boyer University in Madina, Ghana, West Africa.
Fr. Frank Pavone
Fr. Frank Pavone is one of the most prominent pro-life leaders in the world. He was ordained in 1988, is a priest of the Amarillo Diocese and serves full-time in pro-life leadership with his bishop’s permission. In 1993 he became National Director of Priests for Life. He is also the President of the National Pro-life Religious Council, and the National Pastoral Director of the Silent No More Awareness Campaign and of Rachel’s Vineyard, the world’s largest ministry of healing after abortion.
Father Pavone travels throughout the country, to an average of four states every week, preaching and teaching against abortion. He produces programs regularly for religious and secular radio and television networks. He was asked by Mother Teresa to speak in India on the life issues.
He is a member of the Vatican’s Pontifical Academy for Life. He was present at the bedside of Terri Schiavo as she was dying and was an outspoken advocate for her life. He is the author of two books, Ending Abortion, Not Just Fighting It, and Pro-life Reflections for Every Day.
Dr. Karen Swallow Prior
Dr. Karen Swallow Prior is a native of Maine who moved to Virginia from Buffalo, New York, where she completed her undergraduate and graduate studies. She was raised in a strong Christian home and received Christ at a very early age. But it wasn’t until she was in her twenties that Dr. Prior was introduced to the concept of the Christian worldview. This was when her faith became real and she embraced the challenge of not only living biblically, but thinking biblically, too. Her life has never been the same.
Dr. Prior incorporates this love of living and thinking biblically into her teaching and her study of literature and language, and it is what fuels her passion for both. Dr. Prior was the 2003 recipient of the President’s Award for Teaching Excellence. In 2006 she received the Sigma Tau Delta (LU chapter) Teacher of the Year Award. She teaches British literature primarily, with a specialty in Eighteenth Century British literature which she loves for its emphasis on philosophy, ethics, aesthetics, and community, as well as for the correction it offers to the universal human impulse to gravitate toward extremes.
Dr. Prior and her husband Roy Prior live in Amherst where they spend their time renovating their 1912 farmhouse and spoiling their three boisterous and beautiful German Shorthaired Pointers.
