who we are:
Nancy Wood-Lyczak
"What is a nice Unitarian girl like you doing in a place like this?"
This question was posed to me several years ago by an old family acquaintance who, like me, had grown up Unitarian Universalist. We ran into each other at a United Church of Christ gathering, a decidedly Christian event. The man's question reminded me of just how far I had come in my relationship with Jesus Christ.
I grew up attending a Unitarian church where God's name was rarely spoken and Jesus was, at best, a wise prophet. I thought that people who believed in Jesus were sadly misinformed and took it upon myself to show them the errors of their ways every chance I got. Our Catholic Spanish Exchange student found himself rudely awakened from a nap one afternoon when I saw a movie about Jesus on TV. "How can you believe this stuff about The Cross?" I asked him as I shook him awake. "Come see this movie and honestly tell me that you think this really happened."
Paul had his trip to Damascus; I went to Nicaragua. Newly married to my husband, Nathan, we traveled to Central America to do a year of service work and there I met Jesus. The defining moment of my conversion came one Thursday night in a candlelit church when God invited me into a relationship with Jesus. No words were spoken, but the invitation was clear. After some hemming and hawing and plenty of procrastination, I said yes.
When I returned to the states, I followed a fairly traditional path to Christian ministry. I got an MDiv from Harvard Divinity School in 1998, worked as a student minister at the First Congregational Church of Somerville where I met Heather, and fulfilled the various requirements for ordination in the United Church of Christ. Ordained in September 2000, I first served as an associate pastor and have been the sole pastor of The United Church of Winchester in Winchester, NH for more than two years now. I love being a pastor and, when I put on a suit, can even look the part.
But I am still remember what it felt like to be an outsider to Christianity. For a long time I wasn't sure I really belonged in a Christian church and was afraid that people could tell just by looking at me that I didn't receive a confirmation certificate while in 8th grade and didn't know all the verses to "Our Church's One Foundation." Much of my ministry is about making church a place where so-called outsiders feel that they belong—that being a Christian isn't so much about whether your grandparents donated a stained glass window or whether you know what an acolyte is, but whether you have a sincere desire to be a disciple of Jesus Christ. What I've found is that it isn't just new comers to Christianity that need to hear that message. All of us do.
In addition to passion for ministry, I enjoy singing, hiking, knitting, cooking and, sewing Waldorf-style dolls. And, while I sometimes can't believe we are doing it, Nathan and I, along with some hammering help from our two children, Meg and Rye, are building a home in the New Hampshire woods.
Heather Kirk-Davidoff
A few years ago, my dad mailed me an old photo, labeled on the back, "From a pile of photos at church". It's a picture of me when I was about eight years old, standing with my arms crossed, my back against the wall of a Sunday School room. My short hair is sticking out in a few places, and I'm grinning impishly. I'm probably about to run out of the room, grab a handful of cookies at coffee hour and sneak into the side chapel to fool around with the little electric organ with the "disco beat".
I recognized myself immediately. It is a portrait of who I still am, inside my head. I've been a minister for eleven years now and but inside I'm still a kid who feels so at home at church that I don't hesitate to laugh or play or sometimes even stick my tongue out.
After graduating from Harvard Divinity School in 1994, I spent eight years as the sole pastor of the First Congregational Church, United Church of Christ, in Somerville, Massachusetts. When I arrived at that church, its imminent death had already been foretold by two previous ministers. I had no idea how to grow a church, but when I used up all the tricks I knew I started asking around. At first I talked to other ministers, then I talked to my denomination, then I talked to church consultants. My quest led me to Tom Bandy of Easum Bandy Associates and Brian McLaren and the Emergent conversation. Both have influenced me strongly.
Finally, I started talking to the people in my neighborhood who didn't attend my church. I talked to people at playgrounds, in line at the food store and in coffee shops, but my favorite place to do my investigations was a great Irish pub down the street from my church. In 2002, I got a grant from the Louisville Institute to take a sabbatical and do this work full time. I learned a great deal, and un-learned even more.
A new job for my husband brought our family down to Maryland in 2003. After serving as the Spiritual Director of the Interfaith Families Project of Greater Washington D.C. for a couple of years, I came in September 2005 to the Kittamaqundi Community, a 38-year old church that grew out of Washington D.C.'s Church of the Savior. I'm having a blast, and learning lots.
When I'm not doing church work or writing, I like nothing more than to hang out with my husband, Dan, and my three kids, Paul, Isaac and Rosa. We like to hike, swim, bike and lie on the floor reading books.
