Though your destination is not yet clear
You can trust the promise of this opening;
Unfurl yourself into the grace of beginning
That is at one with your life’s desire.

Awaken your spirit to adventure;
Hold nothing back, learn to find ease in risk;
Soon you will be home in a new rhythm,
For your soul sense that world that awaits you.
(excerpt from For a New Beginning by
John O’Donohue)

Contradicting the author above, I will say that my and my family’s destination is clear: Central New Jersey and YOU. But while writing this first newsletter column, I am still in Western Massachusetts, our possessions are about 60% packed in boxes, and we just sold our home.

Soon, very soon, we will be making our new home in the parsonage in Somerset, finding our way to the grocery store, applying for a library card, registering to vote, and partaking in the late summer farmer’s markets that we hear are in great abundance. Mariah, my 20-year-old daughter, is planning on painting the walls of her room. We have decided to get a kitten (we plan to get a dog, but that will wait until Tony, my spouse, is living with us full-time starting in December). This will be our “home in a new rhythm.”

I am so filled with gratitude for the joyful, sometimes challenging, work that you all at TUS and Rev. Carol have done over the previous two years, preparing the way for this moment. I know that you have wished her well as she has moved onto her next position, providing excellent ministerial care and guidance. I, too, have benefitted from her collegial companionship and look forward to that continuing into the future when our paths cross.

Officially, I begin my work with you in early August, though I have been working with the DRE Search Task Force and getting a few other ducks in order. One of those ducks was scheduling two events in August (see elsewhere in this newsletter for details) where we will get a chance to hang out and get to know each other, as well as see some of the fabulous things that took place at General Assembly this past June.

Though I won’t be preaching on Sundays in August, I plan to be at most of the Sunday services and look forward to seeing you then. Throughout the month, I’ll be attending some committee meetings, setting up my office, learning how systems work at TUS, as well as getting a lay of the land by meeting nearby UU colleagues. Once I know a bit more about how my work week flows, I’ll send out word in the weekly emails about when might be good times to drop by to say hello. Right now, the plan for my schedule is Mondays as my day of rest and Thursdays as my sermon writing day (unless there is something that requires adaptation).

As inspired by the blessing at the start of this column: Here I come, my spirit awakening to the adventure of our shared ministry, aspiring to hold nothing back and to find ease in risk, with a growing feeling of home in a new rhythm, my soul experiencing a new world awaiting me.

I am blessed to be on the journey with you,

Rev. Karen