Dear All Souls,

We are writing to update you on our process to find our next senior Minister, who will start July 1, 2024. As you might have heard, last spring the Board decided to switch from seeking a called minister to instead hiring a developmental minister who can help us prepare for a called     minister. After the developmental ministry is completed and we’ve made progress on a few key goals we will set for ourselves, All Souls Church should be in a much better position to call a settled senior minister.

The process to hire a developmental minister is different than what you might be familiar with for a called minister so we’d like to keep you informed about what we’ve done so far, and what will happen this spring. The Board of Trustees and Ministerial Search Committee will work together with the Unitarian Universalist Association to identify and hire the best candidate to fit our needs. Developmental ministers are hired by contract, rather than called by the congregation, and typically work with a congregation for 4-7 years. A large and complex congregation like ours will require a seasoned minister, one experienced enough to help us take on big challenges that might be beyond the limits of a more junior settled minister.

The first step in the process of searching for a developmental minister is for the Board to decide on a few concrete goals for the period of developmental ministry. Typically, goals for a developmental ministry can be about finances, facilities, church culture, conflict, administrative processes – anything the congregation needs to work on that is too ambitious to address during a transitional ministry, requires specific expertise, and/or might limit the pool of ministers who would want to commit to serving us in a settled ministry.

Last week, the Board adopted a set of draft goals which we would now like to share with you. We hope you will join us for a discussion about them on Sunday at 12:30pm  or on Tuesday December 12 at 7pm on Zoom. If you’re not able to join either of those sessions, you can share your thoughts on the draft goals with us via this google form or reach out to any Trustee.

As for the timeline, the Search Committee is working now to create materials to tell potential candidates about All Souls. Using this document and the Board’s goals, we will work with the Unitarian Universalist Association to identify one or more developmental minister candidates in Winter/Spring of 2024. The All Souls Board of Trustees and the Search Committee will interview and recommend a candidate. Then the Board will select and hire them to start after the Reverend Bill Sinkford concludes his transitional ministry with us.

Because this is a hiring process, what can be shared with the congregation will be limited. We will try to keep you up to date about where we are in this process, but not about candidates, interviews, or any negotiations that take place.

Search Committee members are always available if you have questions or concerns. You can find us in person at All Souls on Sundays by looking for the Search Committee label on our name tags. We will occasionally have an information table in Pierce Hall during coffee hour where you can chat with us. And for more information, please visit the All Souls Ministerial Search web page.

T Vatnick and Morgan Duncan – Ministerial Search Committee Co-Chairs
Pam Coukos, Clair Null, and Brian Petruska – Members of All Souls Board of Trustees