With heavy but grateful hearts for all of you, the time has come for us to tender our resignation from Christ Church. Our last Sunday with you will be on August 25th. This has not been an easy decision for us, but sometimes the hardest decision is the best or right one. We understand this may be difficult news and a disappointment for some. Please know that each of you have shaped our priestly ministries in meaningful ways, and it has truly been a great joy and blessing to serve with you. Christ Church will always be in our hearts, and we will miss you, most especially on Sundays in our worship together.
We first stepped foot into Christ Church on the third Sunday of Advent, back in 2019, and worshipped together with you, in the pews, as fellow congregants. We had left our churches in Maine because of family deaths and came to the Hudson Valley to continue to settle estate obligations. We didn’t expect to stay but then the pandemic hit and we went into lockdown. So in August of 2020, we began to serve as your permanent supply priests. Come June of 2021, we answered the call to be your full time priests and co-vicars. It would seem that God had plans different from our own.
Two primary goals quickly emerged. First and foremost was to safely navigate the church through a global pandemic, and through a high-stakes diocesan election to a new bishop. In due course, new life indeed sprung forth from these challenges. A new day has dawned in the the Diocese of Albany with the election of Bishop Jeremiah Williamson. Christ Church has grown in attendance and new faces at all three weekly services, and in participation in pledging, education, and ministerial opportunities. The Sunday morning service is now live-streamed, furthering inclusion and the spread of the gospel, and fellowship at coffee hour is joyously robust. Parish events, such as the Spring-A-Fair made a successful return, and life at Christ Church continues to blossom.
We’ve been honored to participate in this flourishing with you, and hope you will embrace the very real and good work that the parish has accomplished. God’s call is always to new life, and so there is yet more growing to do. Your wardens and vestry, the diocese and Bishop Jeremiah will be working closely together as Christ Church begins a new chapter in its ministry and life of faith.
Our leaving Christ Church will complete our own transition that began five years ago, though we will not be returning to Maine or initially moving into new church positions. Rather, we will be settling into a long awaited home of our own and a season of rest and re-creation in Christ.
To be a disciple of Jesus is to follow him through the everything of our lives to the great freedom and abiding love of God, from whom all blessings flow. May the next few months be a time of blessing and thanksgiving for all of us as we move together through an ending that is yet a new beginning.
Thank you for your love and support over these last five years. Please know that we keep you in our prayers, and please keep us in yours.
In Christ’s love,
Mother Kathleen and Father John
June 4, 2024