Donavan and Cyndee Cain are native Kentuckians, who grew up in the Southeastern part of the state. Donavan is from Corbin and Barbourville and Cyndee from Whitesburg. Raised in protestant churches, they became Episcopalians during their college days, and were confirmed by Bishop Don Wimberly at Christ Church Cathedral, Lexington in 1993.

The couple met at Union College in Barbourville, where Donavan graduated with a Bachelor’s degree in both English and Philosophy-Religion and Cyndee with a Bachelor’s degree in Elementary Education in 1997. Cyndee later completed her Masters degree in Special Education (k-12) at Union College.

They were married in August of 1996 at St. Mary’s Episcopal Church in Middlesboro, where they taught youth Christian Education classes. Donavan served briefly as a newspaper reporter for the Daily Times-Tribune in Corbin before beginning his graduate studies while working in the Assistant Academic Dean’s office at the University of Kentucky Graduate School in 1998.

In 1999, the Cain family, which now included their first daughter Abigail, moved to Boone, North Carolina where Donavan completed a Master of Arts degree in Appalachian Regional Studies at Appalachian State University. His research focused on cultural, historical and political aspects of the Southern Mountains of the Eastern United States, as well as comparative studies of poverty and development in Southern Appalachia and the southern mountains of Honduras.

From 2001-2003, Donavan worked at Berea College as their first Coordinator for Service-Learning. His work included assisting faculty members to connect with not-for-profit service organizations and incorporate service work into their class syllabi. His expertise in Southern Appalachian and his familiarity with local, on-profit and grassroots groups in Eastern Kentucky, West Virginia , East Tennessee and Southeastern Virginia allowed Berea students to work on educational, service-oriented projects throughout the mountains and beyond.

While Donavan was at Berea, he taught numerous courses on Appalachian culture, history and development, presented papers at meetings of the Appalachian Studies Association, and published several articles in The Appalachian Journal, which serves as one of two scholarly journals for the field of Appalachian Studies.

Donavan is a traditional Appalachian musician. His primary instrument is the mountain banjo, which he plays in the traditional “clawhammer” style. He also has collected and performs coal mining music from Kentucky and through the Appalachian Coalfields, both accompanied and unaccompanied, and plays the guitar and the fiddle. He has performed at festivals and concerts around the Eastern United States, including Emory University’s “Arts and Social Change” Weekend in Dacatur, Georgia; at Jamestown Community College in Olean, New York, at the Seedtime on the Cumberland Festival at Appalshop in Whitesburg, Kentucky, and at the national meeting of the Rural Policy Research Institute in Nebraska. He has also had the honor of providing music for readings by acclaimed Kentucky author Silas House, in Louisville, and in Lexington.

From 2002 through 2004, Donavan served first as the staff sponsor and then as the Lay College Chaplain under Bishop Stacy Sauls to the Berea College Episcopal Canterbury Fellowship. From 2003-2004, he organized an Episcopal Fellowship at Transylvania University in Lexington.

The Cains, joined in 2004 by daughter Erin, were members of Good Shepherd Church in Lexington. Donavan served on Good Shepherd’s Vestry from 2002 until he left for seminary. He also worked on both the Worship and Outreach committees and was a member of the Good Shepherd Parish Choir, which he served as Cantor during the Choir’s residency at Gloucester Cathedral in England in the summer of 2003.

In 2004, Donavan organized and performed with a group of traditional Kentucky musicians for a “Traditional Music Eucharist” to open the 2004 Diocesan Convention in Prestonsburg, Kentucky. In 2005, at the request of Bishop Sauls, he organized another “Traditional Music Eucharist” for the national Episcopal Youth Event Staff Eucharist in Berea, and then provided entertainment later in the week for the EYE Bishop’s Dinner at Berea’s historic Boone Tavern.

In 2004, Donavan was named one of 40 nationwide Ministry Fellows through the Fund for Theological Education in Atlanta, Georgia. That summer, he attended a Ministry Fellows’ Conference at Fuller Theological Seminary in Pasadena, California, and in the summer of 2005, through fellowship funding, he completed a month long pilgrimage to important Christian Holy Sites in Israel and Europe. He studied for two weeks at St. George’s College (Anglican) in Jerusalem, completing a travel course on the Palestine of Jesus throughout Israel and the West Bank. Afterwards, he traveled to Rome, Italy and spent time at the Vatican before traveling to the Isle of Iona off the coast of Scotland, one of the earliest Christian sites in the British Isles, and then to York and London, England.

For the past two years, Donavan has worked as a seminarian assistant at historic Grace Church in Lower Manhattan.. While at Grace, he has preached at Sunday and Wednesday worship services, taught Adult and Youth Christian Education classes and Children’s Chapel, worked with the Outreach Committee, assisted with Acolyte Training and served as a liaison to the Grace 203/30s Group.

During the summer of 2006, Donavan completed his Clinical Pastoral Education requirement for his Master of Divinity degree by serving as Chaplain at the Gwinnett Medical Center in Lawrenceville, Georgia, outside of Atlanta. As a Chaplain, he offered pastoral care to patients, families and hospital staff in the Cardiac, Pediatric, Oncology, Intensive Care, Neo-Natal Intensive Care and Trauma/Emergency units of the Medical Center.

While at General Theological Seminary in New York, Donavan has worked on both the GTS Interfaith Encounter and the GTS Peace and Justice Coalition. With the GTS Interfaith Encounter, he organized a tour for seminary students of the 96th Street Mosque, which is the largest Islamic Mosque in New York City. With the GTS Peace and Justice Coalition, he organized “An Appalachian Evening” at General in May of 2006, featuring Kentucky musician and activist Randy Wilson and members of the multi-state Appalachian Delegation to the United Nations, 2006. The event was organized to highlight environmental and poverty issues in Appalachia, especially the practice of Mountain-Top Removal Coal Mining, and to bring awareness to the challenges facing churches in the rural ministry field.

Donavan also served as a music organizer and worship planner for a new “Family Eucharist,” on Sunday evenings in General’s Chapel of the Good Shepherd. He assisted in the liturgical planning of a specifically “Child-Friendly” worship service for the seminary community and organized student and faculty musicians to provide a variety of music for the service.

Cyndee has over 12 years of teaching experience in all grade levels in both rural and urban school systems, including New York City, where she has taught for the past three years at P.S. 187 in the Washington Heights neighborhood of Manhattan.

Abby, 8, enjoys music and drama, and has delighted in family trips to theater productions while in New York. Erin, 3, has, to date, only known “home” to be New York City, with its tall buildings and busy urban life. The Cains have all thoroughly enjoyed the opportunities and experiences of their years in New York, and the travels across the world, but call themselves “Kentuckians at heart” — Kentuckians who are looking forward to their new Kentucky home in Paris.