[Magdalen] Rejoicing

[Jay Weigel]

I have neglected to mention that my former parish, All Saints', Morristown,
TN (with which I am still in touch) recently called a new priest. This is
after several years of turmoil following the retirement of the last one,
who left the place in a financial mess and precipitated a serious
membership decline. (She was pretty much responsible for that, as well as
the financial mess) The place was kept going with the help of interims,
Deacons Jim and Gigi Sharp (about whom more in a moment), and a dedicated
core of members. At one point in their search process they were given
permission by the bishop to extend a call to their then-interim, but he
threw a spanner into the works just as they were about to do so by
announcing that he had accepted another interim appointment, so they had to
start over from scratch! That was almost 2 years ago. But at last they have
a priest, the Rev. Mark Holland. He arrived about three weeks ago.

In the meantime, during that incredibly interminable interim, a couple of
things happened. One was that a longtime friend, Sarai Wender, who I've
known since she arrived there as a somewhat wild teenager and who I watched
grow up, settle down, get married, and become a nurse and the mother of two
delightful young ladies (now grown), studied and has become a vocational
deacon. (As aside note, this is at least the 4th person I know from the
healing professions who has gone that route...it seems a natural one!) And,
as kind of a punctuation to the whole thing, Jim and Gigi Sharp, after
incredibly long journeys through the diaconate (Jim's lasted, if I am
counting correctly, over 20 years), were ordained to the priesthood just
before Christmas and Jim has been assigned as PIC to the small church down
the road in Newport, TN.

So all seems well there at last!