Jennifer Mills-Knutsen is Candidate for St. Lukes UCC, Indiana
(Note: Jennifer was successfully called by St. Lukes on August 28, 2005)

August 8, 2005

Dear Old South Community:
 

My heart is filled with both joy and sadness as I write you this letter.
After 4 years as Assistant Minister of the Old South Church in
Boston, the time has come to move on. I will be a candidate for the
pastor at St. Luke's United Church of Christ in Jeffersonville, Indiana
on Sunday, August 28th. After consulting with Senior Minister Nancy
Taylor and Moderator Jeff Makholm, we have agreed that my last Sunday at
Old South will be October 2, 2005.

As many of you know, my husband Josh has been in Lexington, Kentucky for
the last three years working on his Ph.D. in Philosophy at the
University of Kentucky. I felt called to remain at Old South during this
time to continue the work we had begun together and assist with the
transition. Since the arrival of our new Senior Minister Nancy Taylor, I
have been actively looking and listening for what God might have in mind
next-especially a place that will allow Josh and I to live together again.

After much prayer and discernment, God has provided, and I am very
excited about the opportunity to serve at St. Luke's. They are a lively
and active congregation of 250+ members from the UCC's German
Evangelical and Reformed tradition. The church has a 145-year history in
downtown Jeffersonville, four blocks from the Ohio River and two miles
from downtown Louisville, Kentucky. They have an active youth group and
Sunday school program, choir and handbell ringers. The church members
are proud of their United Church of Christ tradition, and actively
supported the Still Speaking Initiative. A member of St. Luke's
currently serves as Vice Moderator of the Indiana-Kentucky Conference,
and will begin a term as Moderator in 2007.

In addition, the congregation takes their role as a part of the
Jeffersonville community very seriously, and they are active in many
ecumenical partnerships for mission. Together with other downtown
congregations, they share Vacation Bible School, Thanksgiving, Ash
Wednesday and Good Friday services, and operate the Center for Lay
Ministries, a social service center which serves over 15,000 individuals
each year. They also run Loaves and Fishes, where church volunteers
prepare and serve a meal to over 150 people each Saturday. Like Old
South's Sunday's Bread, various churches take responsibility for the
meal, but the program is housed at St. Luke's. The church has also
worked to resettle three refugee families in the last 10 years.

With the St. Luke's congregation, I look forward to preaching every
week, helping to expand their Christian education programming for all
ages, and discerning ways to grow the church. Jeffersonville is 75 miles
from the University of Kentucky, so Josh and I will live in Lexington
until January, when we will move to Jeffersonville.

My time at Old South Church has been full of rich and wonderful
experiences, and I cannot express the depths of my gratitude to this
congregation for the opportunity to serve with you these past few years.
As I have said many times, this is an amazing congregation, and you have
given me an amazing call. In our time together we have prayed,
worshipped, laughed, dined, mourned, met, decided, questioned, learned,
served, worked, walked, talked, sung and loved together with God and one
another. It has been an honor and a privilege.

The scriptures say, "For everything there is a season, and a time for
every matter under heaven." (Ecclesiastes 3:1) As the seasons change and
the time comes to move on to God's next call, I know that the Spirit is
moving amidst and among us all. In God's hands, the best is yet to come
for the Old South Church in Boston.

Faithfully,

Jennifer Mills-Knutsen

---

Welcome Tadd Allman-Morton!

        Old South extends a warm welcome to the newest member of our staff, Ministerial Intern Tadd Allman-Morton. Tadd has held several staff positions as religious education director and membership coordinator for Unitarian Universalist congregations, and most recently served as Ecology Minister at Andover Newton Theological Seminary, where he is entering his final year as a Master of Divinity student. He will be working closely with the 20/30s Fellowship Group and the Christian Service & Outreach efforts during his time with us. Welcome, Tadd!

April 14, 2004
Old South welcomes Kate Layzer as Interim Assistant Minister beginning Monday, May 3.

Kate grew up in northern California. She earned a B.A. in English and American Literature and Creative Writing, summa cum laude, at Brandeis University. She has worked as an editor for several publishers, including Macmillan Publishing and MIT Press.  Kate is married to Len Rothenberg.  They live in Belmont with their children Faith, 18, and Sam, 14.

Kate came to the church as an adult. She has been a member of First Church in Cambridge for eighteen years. Her deepening involvement there led her eventually to Andover Newton Theological School, where
she was elected student commencement speaker for the Class of 2003. At First Church she has been a lay leader, a choir member, a hymn writer, and a preacher. She has served on a wide variety of committees, most recently chairing a Visioning Task Force

Now she is moving from lay leadership to ministerial leadership. As she said to the search committee, it is time for the parent to let go of the bike. The members of the search committee have met in Kate a warm, wise, and funny individual, with a deep love for God and a deep compassion for God's broken instruments on the earth.  The best way for you to begin to know her is in her own words, so here are a few of those.

"I believe that Jesus is God's answer to sin and evil. Not God's solution: evil continues to exist, even to thrive, despite the church's declaration of victory. When I say that Jesus is God's answer, I mean that evil and death have tried to have the last word and have failed."

"I believe that the story we are invited to enter through faith is one of radical welcome, radical acceptance, and grace to overcome all barriers and divisions, and that all people of faith are called and uniquely gifted to participate in this ministry of reconciliation."

"As an interim, I would want to ask not only 'What do you want me to do?' but 'what is God doing here, in this time and place?'"

January 15, 2004  Patrice Receives Call to Sanbornton, NH UCC

As announced at Council last night, our current Interim Assistant Minister, Patrice Ficken, announced the
good news/bad news that she has received a call to serve as the Minister of the Sanbornton, NH UCC church beginning in March. The only bad news is that we had hoped to have Patrice stay with Old South until Easter (and hopefully beyond)
but of course we celebrate in her new call and look forward to her ordination
service at Old South in the spring.