Monday, July 18, 2011

Dean Lloyd: ‘I’m not in this Business to Step Up’


From The Living Church-

A cathedral dean rarely chooses to return to a former parish as priest-in-charge, but for the Very Rev. Samuel T. Lloyd III that transition was an answer to prayer. Lloyd, dean of Washington National Cathedral since 2005, will return in October to Trinity Church, Boston, where he was rector from 1993 to 2005.

“My fundamental calling is as a priest — a preacher and teacher and pastor,” he said. “And the decision for me was to let go of this large, complex, exciting place” and to focus on a pastoral ministry. While he said that returning to his former parish “was a surprise” and “not part of the plan,” the possibility began to emerge as he thought about and prayed about his perceived calling to return to parish ministry.

“I’m not in this business to step up,” he said. “Every step has been to ask what with my gifts I’m being called to do.”

Lloyd sees himself on a journey, and his Boston position will be the next step in that journey. While Lloyd was discerning his future, Trinity Church was searching for a priest amid the retirement of the Rev. Anne Bonny Berryman, who succeeded Lloyd as rector in 2006. The two periods of discernment seemed to converge according to God’s plan.

The dean said his new position as priest-in-charge at Trinity Church entails a structured three-year commitment. Becoming the rector again “is certainly a possibility, but it needs to be prayed through and make sense on both sides.”

More here-

http://www.livingchurch.org/news/news-updates/2011/7/15/dean-lloyd-im-not-in-this-business-to-step-up

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