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Dear UUCSR Community,
We are so delighted to be starting this new shared ministry with you! In our first full week as your co-ministers, we are busy getting oriented, doing onboarding tasks, figuring out our schedules and connecting with staff and committee leads.
Co-ministry has so many benefits! But how is it going to work? Who will be responsible for what? And how long will you be with us? Good questions! Our contracts are for two years– twenty hours a week each–with an option to renegotiate that after one year. We have split the role of minister as equally as possible, but may need to shift some things down the road if the workload is unbalanced. Here is the general plan:
Areas of Responsibility. Both of us will attend Board, Staff and Worship Committee meetings. We will lead the same number of worship services, but Amy will be the administrative lead on worship and supervise the Worship Staff. She will also be the primary Pastoral Care Minister and supervise the Director of Religious Education. Tovis will be the primary for Administration and Operations, Stewardship and Finance, Community Life, Spirituality Groups and Social Justice. Tovis will also supervise the Administrator. (See the Division of Roles Addendum to our contracts HERE.) For simplicity’s sake, you can think of it this way: Rev Amy for Pastoral Care, Children and Youth RE and Worship Administration; Rev Tovis for everything else! There are some grey areas, and it will take some time for us to figure those out. We ask for your patience as we create this truly shared ministry together with all of you.
Availability. In addition to being a co-ministry, ours will also be a commuting ministry. As we shared in our welcome video, Amy lives in San Francisco and Tovis lives near Redwood City (on the mid-Peninsula.) We will each be at UUCSR in-person 1-2 days a week on average, including the Sundays we lead worship. The rest of the time we will be working remotely, available by Zoom or telephone. Once we get a better sense of what happens when, we will be able to share our respective schedules with you, including when we will be on-site and what our office hours are. Rest assured that between the two of us, you will have access to a minister most of the week.
Scheduling Time with Us. The fastest way to schedule a meeting with Amy is to use her Calendly: www.calendly.com/amyzm. If no times there work for you, please email rev.amy@uusantarosa.org. To schedule a meeting with Tovis, please email rev.tovis@uusantarosa.org.
We’d love to connect, so please do reach out. Help us learn about UUCSR, and you! And please introduce yourselves on Sundays: Rev. Amy will be in person this Sunday (8/24), Rev. Tovis the following Sunday (8/31), and both of us for our Ingathering / Water Communion Service on September 7th, which will be followed by a reception to celebrate this new beginning for us all!
With anticipation and joy,
Rev. Amy and Rev. Tovis
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