Children's Minister ~ Mary Ann Putman
I bow my knees before the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, from whom every family in heaven and on earth takes its name. ~ Eph. 3:14-15 (NRSV)
Mary Ann Putman joined the staff of the First Congregational Church as Family Ministry Coordinator in July, 2010. She oversees Sunday Church School and other children's programs, as well as relating to the confirmation and youth ministry teams. She focuses her ministry on families, helping the church to place the family at the center of the church's life. Mary Ann describes her emphasis this way:
"Family Ministry is not the latest church buzz word: it's what church is all about. The God we love, worship, and serve is after all the Trinitarian God - a "family" of divine persons in relationship. And as Christians, we believe that the purpose of Jesus Christ's saving work is to bring all of humanity out of the isolation of sin into loving and life-giving union with his Father through the grace of the Holy Spirit.
The challenge for us, of course, is to become co-workers with our Lord in making family, living as family, and where necessary reconciling and healing family. I believe that this is God's call for the church today, even as it was for the ancient church and for God's people Israel. We've been joined to God in a holy covenant, a bond that is sealed in the blood of Christ. We've been re-created as a true and eternal family, and we share with Christ the mission of gathering everyone, especially the "least ones," into the family of God."
Living in family, and discovering God in family has been the path of Mary Ann's life. She was married in 1972, and raised five children in Tulsa, Oklahoma - three daughters and two sons. Two of her daughters are married, and one of them has two children, Jack and Katie.
Mary Ann is a veteran teacher with twenty years of experience teaching middle school and high school students in religious school settings in Tulsa and Scranton, Pennsylvania. She is a life-long Christian, Roman Catholic by tradition, and she has been active in educational and music ministry since her high school years. She is now pursuing a Master's Degree in Theology at the University of Scranton.
As First Congregational Church pursues a new vision of Family Ministry, Mary Ann says,
"I invite you to look deeply at your relationships at home, at work, and at church to discover where the Lord is waiting for you. "For I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me drink, I was a stranger and you welcomed me, I was naked and you clothed me, I was sick and you visited me, I was in prison and you came to me." (Mt. 25:35-36) Living as family is really very simple, but it is demanding. It brings life's sharpest pain and also its deepest joy. Through it all the Christian knows that Jesus is truly present in the family, with the family, and for the family. And where Jesus is, there is the divine Father because of the Holy Spirit who cries out, 'Abba!' (see Rom. 8:15-17) At First Congregational Ridgefield, let us become more and more, day by day, God's holy family."