Pastor Brian's Preponderant Business - Winter 2025/26

This summer I was blessed with a three month sabbatical. I want to express my tremendous gratitude to you all for this opportunity! Being a pastor is a challenging career but one of the few careers where one is provided the opportunity to take sabbatical leave to focus on rest, spiritual renewal, and personal projects. I want to thank Rev Ryan and our staff who stepped up during my time away, and also to thank all the people of St. Matthew for supporting by providing this time of rest and renewal. I am blessed to be your pastor and so very grateful for your love and support.

For those who missed my adult forum sabbatical presentation, I’m happy to share some highlights here. I began my sabbatical with a month-long cross country road trip. A life goal of mine has been to visit all 50 states and on this trip I toured the remaining states of the continental 48 that I had yet to visit. I still need Alaska and Hawaii, but have now completed my tour of the Lower 48! My journey began in Seattle, WA and I drove to Savannah, GA—hitting all the states I needed along the way.

I started by flying to Seattle. The first full day of my journey I toured Seattle, including stops at the famous Space Needle and the Chihuly Glass Art Museum, and that evening visited a friend from seminary who is a pastor in Burlington, WA. The next day I visited another friend from seminary who is a chaplain in Portland, OR and drove to Cannon Beach in Oregon where I saw elk roaming the streets and where I waded in the Pacific Ocean. Over the next two days I drove across Oregon and was amazed by the natural beauty of the state. I drove north to Walla Walla, WA and saw the town’s history museum, and then drove south to the Oregon Trail Museum in Baker City, OR. My next state was Idaho where I was once again amazed at the magnificent beauty of the natural world. I saw breathtaking waterfalls and went for a swim in pools filled with water from natural hot springs. I spent over an hour gazing over a gorgeous view of the Snake River in Twin Falls, ID. And in Idaho I visited Craters of the Moon National Monument, site of the largest lava field in the United States.

After leaving Craters of the Moon, I drove through more gorgeous scenery in Idaho and Utah where I spent the night. The following day I stopped in Grand Junction, CO to visit a pastor friend who recently served in Glastonbury, CT, and then I reached Denver that afternoon, turned in rental car, and spent the next week attending the MAPS Psychedelic Science conference. Here I presented on my dissertation research about spiritually significant psychedelic experiences. It was great to see friends in that research field and meet new colleagues as well. When the conference was over I spent the weekend in Denver and attended worship Sunday morning at Bethany Lutheran Church in Denver, where I served on my internship twelve years ago.

After visiting with old friends at Bethany, I got my next rental car and ventured on to Nebraska where I spent the night in Scottsbluff. I visited Chimney Rock the next morning and then continued my road trip driving south into Kansas. It was in Kansas that I saw a sign that I was mere miles from the geographic center of the continental United States, so I had to make a detour and visit the spot! I spent the night in Abilene, KS and toured the Eisenhower Museum in Abilene the next day. While in Abilene I also made sure to take a selfie outside Ann Eberhard’s childhood home and send her the picture!

The next day I visited the Wizard of Oz Museum in Wamego, KS and continued south into Oklahoma City. The next day I spent a good deal of time at the  Oklahoma City Bombing Museum, which was deeply moving experience. I then drove to Tulsa, OK where I visited the Philbrook Museum of Art and its incredibly beautiful outdoor gardens. The following day I visited the Cherokee National History Museum in Tahlequah, OK and the Five Civilized Tribes Museum in Muskogee, OK which is located the end of the infamous Trail of Tears. I made it into Arkansas that evening and spent the night in Bentonville, AR.

In Bentonville I visited the Walmart Museum as well as the town’s Museum of Native American History. Midday I drove to Eureka Springs, AR where I found Christ of the Ozarks, the largest Christ statue in North America. The statue is surrounded by a very unique area with several museums, gift shops, and an outdoor amphitheater where they hold passion plays during the summer months. I decided to be spontaneous and buy a ticket.

Unfortunately for me, a thunderstorm began twenty minutes into the show and it was rained out. The next day was a Sunday and I attended service at Thorncrown Chapel, a unique outdoor chapel in the Ozarks. That afternoon I drove for hours to reach Hot Springs National Park and then several more hours to reach Natchez, MS by nightfall.

My hotel in Natchez had a scenic view of the Mississippi River. While in Natchez I visited an African American history museum, an antebellum era mansion, and the some of the largest mounds of the Native American mound building cultures. The next day I drove to Slidell, LA for a bayou/swamp tour and took lots of pictures of alligators! Then I drove back into Mississippi and spent the night in Biloxi where I was able to go on the beach that evening. The following day I drove to Jackson, MS. There was free entry into the Civil Rights

Museum that day, in honor of what would have been the 100^th birthday of Medgar Evers, the Civil Rights leader assassinated in 1963. I recently shared in a sermon about the wonderful coincidence it was that I happened to be there that particular day and that I had the honor of attending the NAACP’s 100^th birthday celebration for Medgar Evers after the museum closed that day. On my way out of Jackson the next morning, I made sure to visit the Medgar Evers National Monument, a small house which he once called home. My next stop was the campus of Alabama University where I visited the Paul W. Bryant football museum. The following day I went to Montgomery, but unfortunately all the places I wanted to see were closed for the Fourth of July holiday. The next day I did a guided Civil Rights tour of Birmingham which was very moving and educational.

The final state on my journey was Georgia. I started in Atlanta. I attended Sunday morning worship at Ebenezer Baptist Church, where Martin Luther King Sr. served as pastor for many years and where Martin Luther King Jr. grew up and served after his first call in Montgomery. This church is where he was serving at the time of his assassination. The church is surrounded by other noteworthy locations such as the MLK National Historic Park and Museum, the King Justice Center, MLK’s childhood home, and his burial location. The next day I met with a friend in Atlanta for lunch and then paid my respects at the burial obelisk of Rev. Howard Thurman at Morehouse College. I also visited the Jimmy Carter Presidential Library & Musuem, the World of Coco-Cola, and Centennial Park in Atlanta. The next day I stopped at Stone Mountain before driving to my final stop of Savannah, GA. I stayed in Savannah two nights and both nights got to share a meal with a clergy friend who I had just seen at the conference in Denver as well. Sightseeing in Savannah included touring the antebellum mansion Owens-Thomas House & Slave Quarters, and a visit to Forrest Gump’s bench, the location where Tom Hanks sat in Forrest Gump. The final morning of my trip I made sure to stop by Tybee Beach before my flight to Connecticut, so I could dip my feet in the Atlantic Ocean, thus completing my cross country road trip from the Pacific to the Atlantic.

This trip was an unforgotten experience. I am so blessed to have had the opportunity to go on this adventure. The other two months of my sabbatical were spent at home in Avon for the most part, with the exception of one week when I travelled with my brother and niece and nephew to Camp Calumet in New Hampshire the week Rev Ryan was the camp chaplain. I also took a trip to visit friends in New York City the final weekend of my sabbatical in September.

During the two months I spent at home, I took three online training courses through the Management Center. These three continuing education sessions were called Managing to Change the World, Investing in People and Performance, and Giving Feedback. These were part of the sabbatical proposal I presented to council.

During this time I also read a number of books. One commitment I made in my sabbatical proposal was to read the Gospel of Matthew as my devotional reading. I appreciated the opportunity to dive deeper into the Gospel of Matthew, typically reading a chapter each day. This summer I also read More Than Merely Eyes Can See written by Susan Carey about the people who attend Grace Lutheran’s Friday night gatherings. I had been meaning to read this book since it was released, and I am so glad to have read this book about our siblings at Grace. Another book I read was The Divine Mileu by Pierre Teilhard de Chardin. This book describes Teilhard de Chardin’s understanding of the physical universe as evolving toward unity with the divine, the role of grace and sanctification, and the presence of the divine milieu all around us at every moment. I also started reading The New Big Book of Christian Mysticism by Carl McColman, which I am still working on. These were the books I committed to reading in my sabbatical proposal and I also read portions of many other books, particularly while I was working on writing a book of my own. I read sections and chapters in over twenty books on theology, philosophy, psychology, and science and religion as I researched and worked on writing my book. I did not finish a draft of my book this summer, but I am well on my way and hope I will be able to finish it soon.

This summer I also finalized two articles submitted to peer-reviewed journals. The first is an article about my dissertation research which has since been published in the Journal of Transpersonal Psychology, which can be accessed below in the section of the newsletter titled “Pastor Brian’s Journal Article”. The second I wrote describes the similarities and differences between psychedelic-assisted-therapy (PAT) and the centering prayer (CP), the contemplative prayer method I practice daily. This article has been submitted for publication and is currently under review.

While I certainly kept busy during my sabbatical, I also made sure to find time to rest and pray and spend time with God. I made a point of going for walks and sitting outside observing nature. I have tried to carry a more relaxed attitude with me as I returned to work this fall. I hope to maintain a healthy work-life balance and encourage the rest of our staff and lay leaders to do the same.

In closing, I want to repeat how grateful I am to have had this opportunity. Thank you for the blessing of this sabbatical and thank you for the blessing it is to be your pastor. 

Advent blessings,

Pastor Brian