Now that the May meeting of the Hamilton Presbytery is history, there are a number of things that are falling into place for the Knox congregation.
As noted in the last blog, Rev. Thomas Kay, who has been serving as interim moderator since last June, recently preached for the call at Knox Leamington, and on Tuesday of this week, the Hamilton Presbytery approved that call, with Rev. Thomas starting his ministry in Leamington on June 3rd.
In the meantime, Rev. Thomas has had some health issues and as the McNab bulletin this week states, he will not be returning to the pulpit until later this month.
That leaves the question as to what is transpiring at Knox Burlington, and on the recommendation of the Knox session, the Rev. Bob Docherty will be assuming the responsibility of interim moderator as of June 1. Rev. Bob has been serving as interim minister for the past three months and that appointment was extended through May as the formalities were addressed at Presbytery.
Now, as interim moderator, Rev. Bob will take on different responsibilities as we move on to seek a new full-time minister. Rev. Bob has indicated that he plans to be in the Knox pulpit on various Sundays, and will seek out others to preside on a Sunday-by-Sunday basis over the next few months.
One of the obvious questions under the circumstances would be as to why Rev. Bob would not continue to be in the pulpit on a more regular basis during the vacancy, and there are several ways to answer that question:
1. As interim moderator, he has his hands full and needs to concentrate his efforts on helping our search committee in their task at hand.
2. It had been the intent all along the regular stated supply would be re-introduced about this time so as to give the pulpit a sense of a vacancy as we move through the search process.
3. Rev. Bob is after all retired and he would like to be able to enjoy some of those benefits of being retired.
Even before that the formalities of Rev. Bob’s appointment of interim moderator were approved by Presbytery, he was very much at work on the search process, wanting to move ahead as swiftly as possible as we approach the summer months.
As a result, he held the first meeting of the search committee this week, laying out the groundwork for the process, with one of the first steps being updating the congregational profile. This is expected to be completed by the end of the month, and thus will be available at that point to be sent to those inquiring about the vacancy here at Knox.
Rev. Bob also outlined a very tight schedule for the search committee, expecting numerous meetings in the weeks ahead, holding out the prospect of beginning the interview process early in the fall.
The vacancy is already listed on the Presbyterian Church of Canada’s website and an ad will be carried in the June issue of the Presbyterian Record, and while 18 applications have already been received, many more are expected after the June Record is delivered.
There is a great deal of confidentiality associated with the search process, but as much as possible, the Knox congregation will be kept informed of developments over the next few months.
And while the search committee as approved by session was introduced to the congregation recently, for those not present at that time, that committee is made up of:
Gerry Craig, Gerry Dickkeboom, Gord Fergusson, Gwen Gayfer, Lynda Gowing, Janine Jaconelli, Haf Lewis, John McGibbon, Charlie Pearson, and Lynne Rutherford.
