Hello!

From the Rev. Bill Pinches

                                                                                                                                                      

I hear that some of you at Mason First Presbyterian Church want to know more about me, my faith story, my interests, and my family!  I was baptized in the Episcopal church, raised in the United Church of Christ, worshiped at an American Baptist church while in college,
did field work at a United Methodist congregation and at a Catholic rehabilitation hospital, and am now quite happily Presbyterian. (I married into a Presbyterian family!)

I grew up in the church. l was active in Sunday school, children’s choirs, youth group, and more. During my high school years, I traveled with my hand bell choir on concert tours (one summer we passed within miles of Mason), I participated in a church-sponsored Friendship Journey to the People’s Republic of China, I served as a counselor at a church-sponsored camp for mentally handicapped adults, and I served as a youth member of an Associate Pastor Nominating Committee. Throughout these years, I became more and more interested in the Bible and the great stories of the faith. I didn’t understand it all – I had lots of questions – and I had a great youth pastor who encouraged us to ask questions.  In college, I wandered away from the faith for a little while. I was stretching and growing and not sure how to integrate the faith of my childhood and youth into my emerging adult life. I continued to have lots of questions, and did not want to settle for shallow answers. I drifted for a while. Three things happened that brought me back to the church: I was having vigorous theological conversations with friends from a variety of faith perspectives that were challenging me to grow in my understanding of Jesus; I fell in love with the Bible after a college course gave me the tools I needed to be able to approach the book on terms that I could relate to; and I became involved in church-sponsored initiatives that promote peace and the alleviation of the world’s problems. I came to learn that the Christian faith is far deeper and richer than I had previously thought, and my faith in God grew by leaps and bounds.

By my senior year of college, I clearly felt that God was calling me to seminary. I didn’t know what would come next. It took another ten years of wrestling with faith questions before I felt a clear call to the ordained ministry of Word and Sacrament. I have now been serving as the pastor of a small congregation in a college town in the hills of western Maryland for almost five years. Over the course of these years, I have grown in my understanding of what effective pastoral ministry looks like, I have grown in my ability to face the challenging situations that come up from time to time in the life of a local congregation, I have developed an appreciation for the fine music created by the Wild Goose Worship Group at the Iona community in Scotland and by the Taizé community in France, and I have been inspired and challenged by the nationally-known ministries of Brian McLaren, Jim Wallis, and Rob Bell (he’s the guy who makes those Nooma videos you have been using in the contemporary service).

I subscribe to more magazines and journals than I have time to read (Biblical Archaeology Review, Christian Century, Congregations, Geez, Interpretation, Presbyterians Today, Presbyterian Outlook, Sojourners, and Weavings). I also subscribe to several podcasts that I listen to while washing dishes after the children are in bed (Speaking of Faith and The News from Lake Wobegon from American Public Media; NPR’s podcasts on Religion, Health and Science, and the Environment; StarDate from the McDonald Observatory; and sermons from several churches that I hold in high regard).

 First, there’s my wonderful wife (and closest friend),
 Katharine.  Katharine and I met in college and have been through a lot together since then. Katharine was a psychology major in college, spent some time after graduation teaching in a school for children with learning disabilities and in a nursery school, and has been home with the children since our oldest was born. Katharine also is a certified La Leche League Leader (nursing moms, if you need help, give her a call!). And, yes, she is pregnant (she’s due May 28), and no, we don’t know what it will be (I’m praying for a healthy human; beyond that, I get less picky.)  Katharine is hoping for a girl (she wants someone to share her favorite childhood books with, like Little House on the Prairie, which our boys never appreciated as much as she would have liked.) I keep telling her to just get real and get used to the fact that she’s going to continue to be surrounded by boys! (Even our pets have all been male.)

We have three lively boys, whom we home school: Andrew (who will be 12 in mid-April), Colin (8.), and Timothy (who is 5 and who prefers to be called “Timmy”). They’re active, loud, delightful, and fun to be around (well, most of the time). They also have remarkably different personalities, as you will no doubt discover! 

Some things that are popular in our house: Star Wars, Harry Potter, Star Trek, The Lord of the Rings, Dungeons and Dragons, Battlestar Galactica, Calvin and Hobbes, Peep and the Big Wide World . . . karate, soccer, baseball . . . biking, swimming, camping (though we don’t do any of those as often as we wish) . . . running, sort of (I picked up running a couple years ago, but I’m a long ways from running a marathon) . . . just about anything having to do with space and time (lately, I’ve been reading Steven Hawking’s A Brief History of Time and sharing interesting portions of it with anybody in the house who is willing to listen) . . . ice cream . . . reading books (lots of books!) . . . play . . . laughter . . . learning. . . .