Rev. Steve Retirement

Dear Deerhurst Presbyterian church family,

On Sunday August 25th, 2024, three things will happen.  I will be 67 years old.  It will be my last Sunday in the Deerhurst pulpit.  I will be retiring.  Amy retired from Trader Joe’s over two years ago.  She has been schooling me on how to do retirement well.  She is still responding well to treatment for metastatic breast cancer.  Now is the perfect time for us to begin a new style of adventuring together.

At the January meeting of Session, Bob Sillars from the Presbytery of Western NY’s Committee on Ministry, will be at the meeting to answer any questions Session has regarding “what’s next.”  The Session will then bring everyone else on board.

I was ordained in 1985.  I arrived here, Easter time, in 2005.  In those 19 years I have fulfilled my first obligation to the PNC to try to have something going on in the building so often that the neighbors get suspicious.  Getting through Covid together was a challenge.  I believe we are “healthier” and ready to serve in new ways because of the adventure.

As a congregation, you have been incredibly supportive as Amy and I have gone through cancers and parental deaths.  When I was recovering from kidney surgery one of my greatest joys was to stand by the door waiting for someone from the congregation to bring us dinner.  I felt “loved, known, and remembered.”

I am honored to be your pastor.  I will be honored to have been your pastor.

Peace on all of us as we celebrate past, present, and future.

Rev. Steve