Reverend Foster Moving On
Five years after her arrival on the South Fork, the Rev. Dr. Katrina Foster, pastor of St. Michael’s Lutheran Church in Amagansett and Incarnation Lutheran Church in Bridgehampton, has heeded a call to take on a new charge.
Ms. Foster, enormously popular among her flocks and credited with revitalizing the churches she leads, has accepted a post at St. John’s Lutheran Church in the Greenpoint section of Brooklyn. She will begin her new post at the beginning of September.
In her five years on the South Fork, which followed 16 years at the Fordham Evangelical Lutheran Church in the Bronx, Ms. Foster was instrumental in seeing through construction of the senior citizens housing complex on the grounds of St. Michael’s. A lover of rock ’n’ roll, the services she leads are punctuated by joyous music, and she has tirelessly ministered to any and all residents in need.
“What’s important to me and to my family is that we follow wherever God is calling us,” she said on Monday. “We felt called out here to be a force to help rebuild the membership at Incarnation and get it on a more solid foundation, and, especially, to come and build the housing at St. Michael’s.”
She described St. John’s as “a very small congregation in a building that’s very big.” Like many urban churches, “their buildings are kind of an albatross,” she said. “We’ll decide what to do with the building — redevelop it, fix it, at very least paint the interior — and grow the congregation. I think Jesus has a future for that place, just as Jesus has a future for the church. My job is to go there and help them figure out what that future is, but I have no doubt that we’re going to go there and have fun, and have really good services, and be an open, inviting community for people who are looking for community and for a connection with God.”
With her departure, Ms. Foster’s two congregations on the South Fork will begin the search for a successor. That process consists of a self-study conducted in conjunction with the Rev. Dr. Richard Hill, conference dean of the Evangelical Lutheran Church of America’s Peconic region. A call committee will be selected to create a ministry site profile, which will be given to the Rev. Robert Rimbo, bishop of the Metropolitan New York Synod. He and his staff will then match the most appropriate candidate with the congregations.
Until a successor is chosen, Mr. Hill will serve as an on-call pastor. “There will be pastors who come out and preach and preside,” Ms. Foster said, “and on those Sundays when they can’t find someone to come out — we are the last Lutherans before London, it’s not always easy to get someone — there are some very capable lay people in both churches who could certainly give a homily.”
She is leaving behind two strong and capable congregations, Ms. Foster said. “There are amazing lay leaders in both places, there are wonderful members, a great sense of hospitality, a great sense of being of service in this community, and the buildings are not falling down,” she said. “If they could call a pastor who has a family, who likes to surf, hunt, and go to the beach, that pastor would be as happy as a pig in slop, and the congregations would be well served.”
Members of the two churches were saddened but understanding of the pastor’s impending move. “She will be greatly missed by members of the congregation and the community,” said Marge Harvey, a member of St. Michael’s who lives in Montauk. “She was a strong, inspirational leader and very much loved by all.” But, Ms. Harvey said, “We feel strongly that, religiously and vocationally, she’s being called by the Holy Spirit to serve in another place.”
“When it becomes clear that God is pulling you into a new possibility, you can’t fight that; it’s unwise,” Ms. Foster said. “This is an opportunity to go and help a congregation figure out their future, to become stronger, to become a force for good, and to be a place where the good news of Jesus is shared. That’s what’s important to us.”