For my Pastor’s Peace this month, I have included my Pastor’s Report for the 2024 Church Conference year. As part of the report, we are asked to give information on our pastoral responsibilities at the place in which we serve. We were to outline specific topics that are from The Book of Discipline as to the responsibilities of a pastor. Those items are the section headings I have put in bold. As November offers us a wonderful opportunity of reflection for the things we are grateful for, I want you to know how very grateful I am for you. I hope the report brings you joy and encouragement as it brought me to write. I look forward to another wonderful year of loving Jesus and sharing the love of Jesus alongside you!

Report of the Pastor for 2024

I love that I get to be a pastor at Sewickley United Methodist Church! If I was not a pastor this is the congregation my family and I would choose to be a part of. The lay leadership is creative and passionate. The ministries are dynamic in the way they show the love of Jesus. The future is full of hope and possibilities. As the pastor, I value the fact that I have come in on the foundations previously built by other clergy members and much of the congregation that is still here today. I get to continue to strengthen the ministries they dreamed up such as the LGBTQIA+ ministries and the Anti-Racism work, say goodbye to those beautiful ministries that have run their course, and with excitement, greet a new season of ministries ahead.

This work is carried out in the following ways:

Providing support, guidance, and training to the lay membership in the church by encouraging participation in growth groups, Sunday school, small groups, ministry teams, and lay leadership classes that are offered on the district. I also meet with the ministry teams to check in on their plans for the year, create new plans, and offer support as needed. They are all invited to the Leadership Board once a year and, as needed, to fill us in on their activity and how we can support them financially and administratively. As a part of the monthly Leadership Board meetings, we have an hour of leadership development on top of a spiritual retreat that we will take once a year. I help to lead a growth group, a new members class, confirmation and lay leadership classes (offered through the church, not the district), and have a teaching style of preaching. I am also available for one-on-one conversations and spiritual guidance.

Ministering within the congregation and to the world by supporting the various ministries of the church and caring for our members and visitors as best as I am able. I do visitations to our shut-ins and those going through tough times. I participate in community events as a show of solidarity from the churches in the community. I foster relationships with the other churches around us and the civil services around us. Our public witness is important to us as we seek to live out the love of Jesus in the community in VITAL ways. We lend a helping hand as it is needed, make ourselves available for space when called upon, and foster a general sense of warmth and welcome, whether we are walking the streets in prayer or worshiping with our doors wide open, and ministering to the world the best way we are able to do through fund raising efforts to support our partners in ministry in the greater United Methodist church.

Administering temporal affairs of the congregation by forming a strong Leadership Board who helps to support this work in many ways. Over the past year, we have formed and implemented a Leadership Board. The Leadership Board is responsible for the administrative life of the church and such things that would be considered “temporal.” Together we help to set a budget, raise funds, nurture staff, set a vision, make goals, and support the ministries of the church. We work behind the scenes to make sure our ministries have what they need to flourish! It has been a challenge and a joy to be a part of the implementation of this type of board and to work alongside the nine members who serve on it.

The above paragraphs do not fully cover all that is done here at Sewickley United Methodist Church. This congregation is such a generous, caring congregation, and I truly am blessed to be a part of them. In order to give to them as good as they give to me, I am mindful of my own self-care and spiritual development and again am blessed by a congregation who supports it. I am engaged with a Spiritual Coach twice a month for two hours a session. I take self-care days as needed, a trip once a year for Spiritual care, and receive continuing education through my work on the Board of Ordained Ministry and serving as a Lay-Leader Class teacher on the district. I also meet with my Clergy Covenant Group once a month. My husband and I are committed to a regular exercise routine, and upon the care and guidance of a church member, I have adapted a cleaner style of eating (most of the time). These are all activities I will engage in over the next year as well.

To wrap up this report, it is always a blessing for me to sit and write this each and every year. It allows me time to reflect on the joys and challenges that have passed and the hope for what is to come. I am grateful for whatever time I am given with the good people of Sewickley United Methodist Church and the community in which we serve and live.

From one light to another,
Pastor Hannah Loughman