Dear First Parish Family,

I am thrilled to introduce you to two new members of the First Parish staff team who will begin their service to the congregation on Sunday August 11, when I return to the pulpit.

Jen Hayman (she/her) begins her tenure as our Director of Music in August. In this role, Jen will lead the First Parish Choir two Sundays per month and support Joe Reid and Linda Brown-San Martin in their leadership on the remaining two Sundays of the month.

Jen is an incredibly talented choral director who truly understands music as ministry. For ten years she served as Director of Music and Arts at All Souls Church in Washington, DC, where she grew the music program to include 250 participants in 7 ensembles. Having worked with Jen for many years, I know her to be a creative, collaborative, warm and caring leader whose musicianship centers the worship life of the congregation and building the Beloved Community. Highly respected throughout our denomination, Jen currently serves as president of the Association of UU Music Ministries. I’m thrilled that she is joining our team, and I hope you will give her a warm welcome when you meet her in August.  Also…this is great time to consider joining the choir!

I’m also pleased to introduce you to Sophia Doescher (she/her, they/them), who is our new ¼ time Assistant Minister for Worship. In this capacity, Sophia will provide continuity in worship leadership on the Sundays when I am away from the pulpit. She will also be available for emergency pastoral care and other duties after church on Sunday.

Sophia is a recent graduate of Harvard Divinity School and last year served as Intern Minister at the First Church in Belmont, where she was beloved by staff and congregants alike. During seminary Sophia served as a chaplain at the Boston Hospital Center and McLean Hospital, and worked at the First Church Shelter where she helped develop the Public Shower program for unhoused people in Cambridge. Sophia brings to First Parish a passion for worship, community-building, spiritual care, and social justice. Please give her a warm welcome when she joins me in the pulpit on August 11.

Friends, I have spent July vacationing with my family and taking study leave to prepare sermons for the upcoming church year. I hope that you, too, have had opportunities for rest and renewal this summer.

This fall we embark on a new phase of our ministry, as we work together to achieve the critical developmental goals that will help us grow and strengthen our congregation, and reach out with love and justice to the larger world.

This is a time of great promise for First Parish, and as the new church year begins I hope you’ll consider how you might commit to becoming more deeply involved in this community that we love and this ministry that we share.

None of us can be certain what this fall will bring for our nation or our world. No matter what happens: we will need one another.

I look forward to seeing many of you in worship on Sunday August 11.

With love,

ROB
Rev. Rob Hardies, Lead Minister

From Jen Hayman:

In this great turning, we shall learn to lead in love… from We Shall be Known by Karisha Longer and Sarah Nutting (MaMuse)

Greetings! First Parish Community,

Recent events in our nation have filled me with a sense of purpose and budding possibility that I have not felt in many years. In the words of MaMuse: It is time now. It is time now that we thrive. It is time now, and what a time to be alive! How fortunate I feel to be joining your community at this time of great potential, of dreaming, and of manifesting a new and bright future, both for the country and the church.

As I imagine our future together, I wonder: how can our shared music ministry meet this moment? How boldly can we live this faith both within and beyond our community? How much will we risk to build the bright future we dream of? I look forward to exploring and hopefully experiencing the answers to some of these questions this church year.

As we begin the ramp up to Homecoming Sunday on September 8, I want to invite you all to consider joining or re-joining the First Parish Choir. We will begin our season with a choir retreat on Saturday, August 24 from 3:30-6pm, where folks will have an opportunity to sing together, set some goals for the music program this year, and learn a little about my philosophy for music as ministry. The retreat will take place at First Parish and will be followed by a potluck dinner. The choir will begin rehearsing regularly on Tuesdays from 7-9 pm starting August 27. On the fence? Please consider joining us on Sunday, August 25 at 9:30am for a summer pick-up choir. All are welcome! 

Questions or ideas? Please feel free to reach out to me at jhayman@firstparishcambridge.org.

With much anticipation,

Jen

And from Sophia Doescher:

Hello First Parish,

My name is Sophia Doescher and I am delighted to introduce myself as your new Assistant Minister of Worship. You may recognize me from a guest sermon that I gave last year, How We Experience Change: Allowing for Transformation. Since then, I have been practicing what I preached in a year full of growth and transformation as I completed my Ministerial Internship at First Church Belmont, after graduating with my Masters of Divinity from Harvard Divinity School in May 2023. In addition to pursuing UU ordination, I have completed my training to become a hospital Chaplain specializing in Mental Health Chaplaincy. In my work at hospitals and the Parish I bring a commitment to creating sacred space grounded in curiosity and embodied wisdom. I am looking forward to discovering how I can best support each of you and the community as a whole as we enter this year together, holding the joys and sorrows with care. 

It has been a joy to get to know a few of you during the hiring process and when I guest preached last year, and I can’t wait to meet you all this Fall.

Yours in Community,

Sophia