Dear Good Shepherd community, 

I am very pleased to announce that the Rev. Paige Alvarez Hanks has accepted our call to become our next Priest for Pastoral Care. Paige is currently serving St. Paul’s Cathedral in Oklahoma City as a clergy associate. She will begin her ministry here at the end of May. 
 
I am very excited and pleased that the Holy Spirit has led us to Paige and Paige to us. The search advisory committee and I found Paige’s personality to be very warm and engaging. She engenders trust immediately. Staff members and those involved in pastoral care shared with me how much they loved being with her and felt that she would add a lot to this important area of ministry and care in our community. 
 
Paige brings to this position her leadership and organizational experience as a school principal and as a clergy person. During a short fieldwork assignment, she created an entire pastoral care program for the parish she served. At the Cathedral in Oklahoma City, Paige has helped organize liturgical ministries from customaries to training. She is a self-starter and a joyful presence of God’s love. 
 
I have added the dimension of wellness to our pastoral care ministry program, and I believe Paige is the right person to help us create new possibilities for this ministry. Paige will be joined by her husband David. Paige and David have an adult daughter Amelia who lives in Florida. 
 
I ask for your prayers for Paige as she transitions to Good Shepherd and for prayers of thanksgiving for a very rewarding search process. 
 
In faith and gratitude, 
Channing 

The Rev. Channing Smith, Rector

Dear Good Shepherd family,

It is with a grateful heart and great anticipation that I look forward to joining the family of Good Shepherd as your Priest for Pastoral Care. Our mutual search has been filled with many moments where the presence of the Holy Spirit was made known and the buds of our ministry together are already being revealed. Spring is truly in the air!

While my spouse and I are both native Floridians, Texas is a familiar place for us; we raised our daughter and worked for many years in North Texas and so while living in Austin may be new to us, it feels a bit like coming home.

The ministry of caring lies at the heart of the church’s life. Joining in your current ministries of responding to God’s people and dreaming with you about new ways to imagine how we might care for one another seem to be great ways to begin to develop our relationship as priest and people in God’s church.

I will continue to join my prayers with yours for this transition and the ways in which we will grow together as faithful and loving people of God. I give thanks to Channing for his leadership and call, to the clergy and staff who have been so welcoming, and to the committed lay members of the search committee for their faithful service. And above all, I give thanks to God for preparing the way to be able to join you all in ministry.

Faithfully,
Paige Alvarez Hanks