Exciting News from the Board of Trustees
We have hired our new minister, Reverend Alan Mead, and a very accomplished organist, Dr. Carl Schwartz. Alan and Carl will officially join us in January, and you can learn more about each of them below.
Reverend Alan Mead
I am The Rev. Alan Mead, and I am an Episcopal priest who has served in parish and interim ministry for over 40 years. When I retired from fulltime ministry, my wife Pat and I initially moved to Virginia Beach, where we bought a condo on the Chesapeake Bay. We now live at Collington, a CCRC in Mitchellville, MD. We enjoyed Virginia Beach, where I did two interims and many Sunday supply engagements, as well as kayaking in the Bay, with almost daily morning and evening beach walks. When our daughter and her family planned a move to Chesapeake Beach in Maryland, we decided to move to Maryland as well, planning on remaining close to her. We had friends at Collington and when a cottage was offered, we jumped at it. I am not at all ready to fully retire, though, and both Pat and I were excited when Christine Cross contacted me and began exploring the possibility of ministry at St. Christopher by the Sea. As we talked and visited Pat and I have become even more excited and we both look forward to beginning this new ministry with you. Pat and I enjoy walking, reading and conversation with each other and with friends. I have finally learned to bake a really good loaf of sourdough bread, and we both enjoy cooking and creating mostly vegetarian and seafood dishes. We both enjoy traveling and I love photography, searching for that perfect sunrise or sunset photo! I do have a love of monochrome photography as well and pursue that with much joy. We are devoted to our daughter and her family, and to three other grandchildren from our son’s family, the oldest of whom recently began working at St. Monica in Dallas, Texas as Music Director. I absolutely love celebrating and preaching and caring for individuals and families in a congregational setting. During the past 20 years my focus has been on transitional ministry and occasional Sunday supply in Episcopal congregations. One of the joys I experienced in transition ministry has been, and continues to be, the richness of working with pastors from other denominations; learning from them, especially as I worked for Interim Ministry Network on a contractual basis, writing newsletter articles and meditations for publication.
Dr. Carl Schwartz
A church musician for 57 years, Carl Schwartz has served churches of several denominations in the Washington, D.C., area, North Carolina, and Vermont, and has been Director of Music at All Hallows Parish South River for the past ten years where he directed an ambitious volunteer choir program. He is a graduate of Davidson College, and he earned the Master of Liturgical Music and Doctor of Music Arts degrees in Organ Performance from the Catholic University of America. Carl is a member of the American Guild of Organists (AGO), the Organ Historical Society (OHS), and the Association of Anglican Musicians. He has been Dean of Potomac Chapter AGO, AGO District Convener, TriChapter Chair, and chair of the 2011 OHS National Convention in Washington, D.C. For many years he coordinated a regional Evensong Festival in the northwestern area of the Episcopal Diocese of Washington and several Diocesan Choir Days in the Diocese of Vermont. Carl is active in pipe organ work representing Austin Organs, Inc. of Hartford, Connecticut and assisting local colleagues from time to time in their efforts. Carl and his wife Linda are natives of the DC area and are parents of two adult children.