Pastor North
OAK PARK, IL—Pastor Kathy North will be installed on Sunday, August 10 2008, at 9:30 a.m., as the pastor of Good Shepherd Lutheran Church. Pastor North will be the 7th pastor in the church’s 70 year history. “Everyone is invited to help us welcome our new pastor and spiritual leader,” says Jan Salzman, president of the congregation. “We look forward to her ministry with us and her participation in the Oak Park community at large for years to come.”
In the tradition of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, the largest Lutheran church body in the U.S., Good Shepherd established a Call Committee, an appointed group of church members, to oversee the process of searching for a new pastor. The Committee worked in partnership with the Metropolitan Chicago Synod office of the ELCA by interviewing candidates and traveling to locations throughout the Midwest to hear applicants preach in their own environments. With a unanimous recommendation and vote of acceptance, on June 22nd, Pastor North has become the next Pastor at Good Shepherd.
Having earned a B.A. in biology from Knox College, and following a management career in the private sector, Kathy North received her Master of Divinity degree from Lutheran School of Theology at Chicago in 2001. She most recently was Pastor at Good Shepherd Lutheran Church in North Aurora where she demonstrated a unique talent for bringing people of different cultures and languages together into a combined worship. The ELCA has hailed her as a “visionary”, offering a good fit for this Oak Park church and their unique style of Lutheran worship and inclusive philosophy. The Oak Park community will benefit greatly from her leadership in these areas, adding enthusiastic energy and an ambition for bringing together people from various backgrounds.
