The UUCC Minister Search Team is still on track to complete the work you’ve asked us to do. We are in the final phases of interviewing and selecting a Settled Minister to help lead our UU Community into the future. And we’re on schedule, as we announced in the fall, to wrap up this work in the next two months.
About three weeks from now, in early April, we expect to announce the culmination of our months-long search. We are wrapping up the process of meeting a few ministers in person over the course of separate weekends, spending several hours with each in informal gatherings, more structured interviews, and Sunday services in other cities.
Based on the guidance you, our members, gave us in the congregational survey and a series of face-to-face meetings, we’ve been searching for a prophetic leader who’s an inspiring preacher, an excellent listener and facilitator, and one who is experienced in congregational governance, social justice work, and conflict resolution. We are encouraged by the results of our search so far.
It won’t be long before, as we fully expect, we are able to present to you the candidate who best fits the description of Settled Minister that we heard from you. After an offer is made and accepted, our Negotiating Team will work out contract terms. At that point, and after the necessary due diligence is complete, we will make the announcement.
Then comes the all-important Candidating Week, April 28 to May 5, during which we will introduce the candidate to our UU Community. The candidate will lead services on consecutive Sundays and meet with members and staff over that eight-day period. We also are planning some relaxed and fun activities, so each of you can get to meet the candidate in more casual settings. The week will culminate in a special Congregational Meeting after the service on Sunday, May 5, to confirm our candidate.
The Board of Trustees has announced an effort to change our UUCC Bylaws to allow absentee voting on calling a minister. Under the proposal to be voted on at a Congregational Meeting on March 24, voting in real time will also take place – both in person and online.
Under our Bylaws, balloting for a Settled Minister requires a 90% “yes” vote to authorize the call. The Search Team strongly urges you to attend the May 5 meeting rather than vote absentee, if at all possible. In our experience, congregational decisions are best made when we can gather in community. And we hope that members who vote have heard both sermons by the candidate and attended other activities of Candidating Week.
Guided by your wishes, the Search Team has been honored to do this essential work. We hope and expect that you will agree with us on a candidate who can serve as a spiritual, moral and administrative leader, guided by our liberating faith and our UUCC Mission and Vision.
Your UUCC Minister Search Team,
Barry Ahrendt
Althea Clark
Mic Elvenstar
Ellen Holliday (co-chair)
Rebekah Visco (co-chair)
Dave Warren
Kathryn Whitfield
Email us at: ministersearch@uuccharlotte.org