On August 18th of this year, I will have been the interim pastor for a full year here at Berlin. As a minister, it has been one of the best years of my life. Personally, the summer has been challenging, (you can ask me about that personally, if you’d like) but being here has not. This work calls to me, and I hope you have been satisfied with it. In the year that I have been here, we have worked well with each other and accomplished many of the interim tasks.
- I believe I have spiritually “joined with the church” and that I wish the best for you.
- Next, we have done some work on the history of the church.
- We have dealt with major changes in staff.
- With the work done at the retreat, we now know who we are and what we have. We have begun to develop a plan for the future based in what God assigns us to do. We have grown in membership, grown in participation at events, and, I hope grown spiritually. I have been recently told that the wedding of Erika Haba and Michael Russo will be the first wedding here in years. A second request came in recently for a daughter of the church to be done in 2027! We have had baptisms and funerals – covering the whole circle of life.
In short, we’re alive and ready to go into the future, we have begun listening for God’s will and we have our ability to recognize it having knowledge of the Bible, a community that enjoys being together
In September, we will extend our community to include animals as well, with a Blessing of the Animals on the day of the Feast of St. Francis.