Two days of record warm weather (Syracuse was warmer than Los Angelos yesterday, and I didn't even get to play any golf!). Wow! But a new wind sweeps clean as we are finding out today. Stiff winds and a driving rain is driving the temperatures to more normal January weather.
This posting is not meant to be a weather report. It is always good to know the "signs of the times" as Jesus suggested, the weather notwithstanding but also duly noted.
Over the last few postings I have been sharing some thoughts on our life together in this region of the United Church of Christ in New York over the last year and as we look toward the future. As I was writing, however, I realized how much ministry I was missing. Most of my work is with local churches and their pastors. Therefore, most of my writings on this blog regarding ministry assumes ministry in a local church setting. This is important, but it isn't all there is.
And so, here's a tribute to those involved in "Specialized Ministries".
What is Specialized Ministry? Well, it includes almost any one with ministerial authorization (ordained, licensed or commissioned) that is involved in other than pastoring a local church. Chaplains, pastoral counselors, community organizers, interim ministers, conference staff, professors, parish nurses, missionaries, Christian educators are among those callings that fall within the rubric of Specialized Ministries.
Both Oneida and Susquehanna Associations have Family Counseling Ministries. Jennifer Hamlin-Navias and Michael Heath are UCC ordained ministers involved in the Oneida Family Counseling Ministry. Joanne Lanfear and Wayne Gustafson are pastoral counselors with the Susquehanna Family Counseling Ministry. Susquehanna also has given Dual Standing status to FCM counselors Bob Godbout, Paul Pitkin and Bianca Podesta. George Van Arnam and Denise Frampton-Pearsall also serve on the pastoral counseling team in Oneida.
These Family Counseling Ministries began out of the concern to help local churches and pastors strengthen families in crisis. For more than 30 years in Susquehanna and more than 10 in Oneida this commitment to offer high quality, trained professional counseling at reduced rates to our churches has provided a vital ministry.
Hospitals:
Jacquie Lewis and Jane Winters (Susquehanna) and Bill Grosch (HMA) serve as hospital chaplains. Jacquie is a chaplain at Cayuga Medical Center in Ithaca and part time pastor at the United Methodist Church in Varna, NY. Jane is a chaplain at Schuyler Hospital and part time pastor at First UCC, Elmira. Bill is the chaplain at one of the hospitals in Albany (sorry I don't know which one, Bill). He also serves as a supervisor of Clinical Pastoral Education.
Colleges and Universities:
Kathleen Buckley and Sean Whitehead (Black River/St. Lawrence) serve as chaplains at St. Lawrence University. Sandy Damhof (HMA) is the chaplain at SUNY Albany. Meredith Ellis (Susquehanna) serves as the chaplain at Ithaca College and Kelly Sprinkle (Oneida) is the chaplain at Syracuse University. Doug Green (Susquehanna) works as a volunteer chaplaincy program at Cornell and J.K. Boodley (Susquehanna) volunteers at Ithaca, as well. Chuck Maxfield has just become the interim chaplain at SUNY Cortland.
Steven Butler Murray (HMA) is a full time professor at Sienna College. Mark Lawson (Oneida) is an adjunct professor at LeMoyne College. Chuck Maxfield and Chris Xenakis are adjunct professors at SUNY Cortland, and Steve Johnson (all of Susquehanna) teaches at the Broome County Community College.
Jennifer DeWeerth, part time pastor in Deansboro (Oneida), is dean of students at Madison County Community College. Nathan Wright works at SUNY Albany in the financial resources department for international students.
Prisons
Kurt Ellis and Jim Turturro (both Oneida) and Steven Slakovitz (HMA) are presently serving as NYS prison chaplains (sorry I don't know the names of the facilities, guys).
Military
John Gibbon, formerly pastor of the Park Church, Elmira, is serving as a chaplain in the U.S. Army. He and his unit await redeployment to Iraq.
Hospice
Steve Smith (Essex) and Chris Boyd (HMA) serve as Hospice chaplains.
Parish Nursing and Christian Education
Sandy Graichen at Trinity UCC, Rome and Helen Scmitt at Fairmount Community Church, Syracuse (both Oneida) serve as parish nurses. Jannie DeWees (Oneida) is a commission Christian educator at UCC Bayberry.
Phil Grigsby (HMA) has been the long time director of SICM (Schenectady Inner City Mission). John Miller (HMA) besides pastoring the Evangelical Protestant Church in Albany, is the director of the Capital Region Council of Churches. He is also involved with alternatives to incarceration and anti-gun violence advocacy groups in Albany.
Andrea Stoeckel (Oneida) Joanne Lanfear (Susquehanna) and Carolyn McPherson (Susquehanna) are trained (by the Interim Ministry Network) intentional Interim Ministers. Wayne Gustafson and J.K. Boodley are also fine interims serving our churches.
We also have pastors from other denominations that are serving our churches as Intentional Interims: David Asby in Corning and Catherine Taylor in Ithaca (both Susquehanna; and Paul Dreyer-Wiberg in Plainville (Oneida). Each of these pastors have been granted Dual Standing by their respective Association's committees on ministry.
Marjorie Purnine is the Dean of the New York School of Ministry. Geoffrey Black and the Regional Conference Ministers are authorized to do conference ministry. Tim Brown is commissioned (by HMA) to work with youth with the UCC Coalition of Gay, Lesbian Concerns.
I am thankful for the vital ministries of all of these individuals who serve in non traditional ministerial settings. The whole church, to say nothing of our local churches and church members, benefits greatly by these essential ministries to the community.
Increasingly, people who come before committees on ministry to begin the discernment process towards authorization for ministry feel called to pursue specialized ministries rather than going into local church pastorates. By the end of their formal preparation (up to this point this has taken place in seminaries) many of these become local church pastors. However, the desire to do specialized ministry is becoming more and more apparent.
Indeed, even when persons want to be local church pastors, they specialize. Steve Ruelke was officially called to be the associate pastor at North Church, Middletown (HMA). However, the essential part of his terms of call noted that his primary duty was to begin an outdoor church in the streets of Newburgh, specifically reaching out to the homeless population. Likewise, First Congregational, Albany (HMA) called Nathan Wright to be their associate pastor, with an emphasis on doing interim ministry (in his case at the Clinton Heights Community Church). John Speers, a seminary student In Care of Hudson Mohawk, is seeking ordination as a new church planter. He wants to "plant" a church in Saugherties.
On Monday I had a regular check-up with my pulmonary specialist, Dr. Davin. He's been treating me for asthma and sleep aphnia since 2002. It was a great appointment. Last year he had told me that if I lost weight, I'd go along way toward curing both of these conditions (to say nothing of my high blood pressure and cholesterol). In the process he called me obese. That did it! Last year I lost 50 pounds. Because of this I was able to go off all of my medications and Dr. Davin told my I might even be able to get off my cpap machine (the mask for my sleep aphnia). Beside this, my lung capacity improved by 20%.
In the process of telling me this Dr. Davin indulged one of his loves: talking about all things philosophical and religious. This time he was telling me of a book he had read on the films of Ingemar Bergman by Jesse Kalin, a professor from Vassar. Most fascinating and profound to him in reading this book was the first chapter, entitled, "The Geography of the Soul." The professor went on to talk about 6 "landmarks" of the soul and how Bergman addressed them in his films.
Dr. Davin listed off the landmarks. I can only remember a few of them: forgiveness, shame, anger, and aspiration. I do want to read this chapter, but in the meantime it made me think of the geography not only of the soul but of the church and of ministry. This geography continues to change, if not necessarily in substance, at least in form. The landmarks are still there, but they look different and they have different purposes.
Ministry is changing. There are more ways to do ministry and more settings in which to do ministry. That's why we've needed to revamp the old Local Church Seeks a Pastor Manual that was a staple of search committees for many years. That's why there are new, alternative tracks for ordination. These changes are not bad nor are they good in and of themselves. Change happens as differing needs, challenges and hopes arise. Sometimes we have to be hit between the eyes that we have to change (being called obese, for instance), then we have to decide what we need to do and then commit ourselves to doing it. And, we need to realize that we must keep at it. Reverting to old habits will take us back to where we were at square one.
I guess what I'm saying is that every setting of ministry is specialized...or at least special. I'm glad to be living in this day and age where doing things differently is highly valued and possible.
Blessings,
Rick Cowles
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