Maine news, sports, weather | Kennebec Journal, Augusta, Maine

UNITARIAN UNIVERSALIST COMMUNITY CHURCH

New leader to be installed Sunday

Raised in South Dakota, she attended Harvard Divinity School

BY MECHELE COOPER Staff Writer

AUGUSTA -- Sunday's installation of the Rev. Carie Johnsen as new minister of the Unitarian Universalist Community Church will be a historic moment.

click image to enlarge

The Rev. Carie Johnsen will be installed Sunday as the new minister for the Unitarian Universalist Community Church of Augusta.

Staff photo by Joe Phelan

Select images available for purchase in the
Maine Today Photo Store

This is the first time a minister has been installed at the church since the All Souls Unitarian and Winthrop Street Universalist churches consolidated in 1992 to become the Unitarian Universalist Community Church.

"It's something people in the congregation keep lifting up, that this is historic moment for us," Johnsen said.

Helen Zidowecki of Litchfield, a church member since 1980, said that at the time the two congregations joined together, the Unitarian minister became minister of the newly formed church.

"He was already in the minister's role and was not installed, so this is the first time for us," Zidowecki said.

Johnsen, 46, of Winthrop said she completed seminary at Harvard Divinity School in 2009 and was ordained in the First Parish Duxbury and First Parish Brewster.

She was raised in "a typical Midwestern Lutheran family in South Dakota," she said, then moved to Massachusetts in 1986.

"I moved to Cape Cod and was busy working in social services and raising a family, then I moved up here to Augusta in 2009," Johnsen said. "One of the things I say about moving to Maine is it feels kind of like an integration of my years in rural South Dakota and in New England. Maine is an integration of those two cultures, which is a nice match for a ministry."

Johnsen, who is divorced with two adult children, said she is excited to be able to minister the Unitarian Universalist congregation.

"There a wonderful group with a great deal of energy and enthusiasm," she said. "It's a very vital, dynamic community."

She said 206 people belong to the church, along with about 100 children and youth.

Dan Sorensen, of Mount Vernon, had a hand in choosing Johnsen for the job.

He said Johnsen has an extraordinary capacity to "look at people, to be with people and understand what's going on with them."

"To understand what they're experiencing at that moment and pay very close attention to that is very empathic," Sorensen said. "She has the capacity to understand what's going on, and I think that's an outstanding characteristic of hers. She has more than met our expectations."

Johnsen said several years ago the congregation considered building a new church in Manchester. Members also thought about razing the rustic, graying, timber-sided church at Winthrop and Summer streets and building a new on the same spot.

"The plan for the last few years is to join together our three buildings," she said, "our church building, our sanctuary is at 69 Winthrop St.; the administration building, at 71 Winthrop St.; and our annex, on Summer Street. In the interim period, they remodeled the sanctuary and completed renovating the administration building."

She said the church is a strong ally of the gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender communities and that she is an advisory member of the Religious Coalition Against Discrimination.

The coalition consists of religious leaders in Maine who advocate and seek justice around the gender equality and sexual orientation issues, she said.

"So I will continue to be active in that role and capacity in the community and congregation in the larger state of Maine," she said.

Mechele Cooper -- 623-3811, ext. 408

mcooper@centralmaine.com