Search for a New Minister is a Study inContrasts for Three Brooklyn ChurchesBY ARTHUR KROEBERLosing a minister is, in the usual course of events, the most traum atic experience a church can undergo. Downtown Brooklyn congregants compare it to losing a parent or an old friend; and the period of transition between ministers, which often lasts two years or more, can be disorienting, as the congregation is left without permanent leadership.The problem is particularly acute for members of certain Protestant denominations which, lacking an ecclesiastical hierarchy of bishops taking care o f pastoral appointments, throw the search process into the hands o f local churches. In addition to coping with the difficulties o f keeping the church and its programs running smoothly, the church%u2019s lay leadership must conduct the long and sometimes agonizing process of searching for a new helmsman%u2014a process that can take up dozens and hundreds o f hours in interviews and committee members over a period of years.Three local churches have gone through the search process recently, the most notable being Plymouth Church of the Pilgrims on Hicks St., which has been searching two years for a worthy inheritor of the mantle of Henry W ard Beecher, the church%u2019s first minister.The two others, First Presbyterian on Henry St. and Old First Reformed Church on SeventhP lym o u th %u2019s Rev. Avery M a n c h e s te r w ith H en ry W ard B e e c h e r%u2019s portrait.Ave. have less of a historical burden to bear but distinguished themselves by making unusual choices. First Presbyterian hired its first black pastor, while Old First called back into the pastoral field a man who had left it 15 years ago to run his own business.First Presbyterian%u2019s search has been rewarded with the greatest publicity; the election o f the Rev. Paul Smith o f Atlanta as the church%u2019s first black minister found its way on to the front page of the m etropolitan section o f the New York Times in January.Smith%u2019s election at the January 26 church service m arked the endo f a process that began with the resignation nearly two and a half years earlier o f the church%u2019s former minister, the Rev. Dr. Samuel Taylor.The formal selection process, however, didn%u2019t start until November of 1983, when the congregation chose a ten-member Mission Review Committee to take a long iook at the state of the church and what it ought to do infh p fu ti irThat committee also had a staff member o f the New York City Presbytery. According to Douglas Grandgeorge, a member o f theContinued on Page 4Political SeasonGets Started as%u2022 _ %u2022$Round-Up Of CampaignBattles to Come in DowntownA ***** I m!*4*!**4* !&***%u00bb** 4%age 17yReturn to the Tradition of Faster, Better Service Is Her PromiseyBY LIZ KOCHThe beleaguered Brooklyn postal service will again return to the tradition of service through rain and snow, not to mention to the correct address and before dusk falls. That was the message from the newly appointed General Manager of Brooklyn Division, Linda Sanchez, at her first public appearance in the post on May 27.Sanchez, who is taking on her job as part of a nationwide restructuring of the U.S. Postal System, has succeeded Manager Post Master of Brooklyn Jack Lazard Jr. as the new person in charge.She, however has a broader job than the one Lazard has retired from . Sanchez will have jurisdiction over Brooklyn, Staten Island and Linda S an chez (Phoenix/K irk Photo)Long Island City.The realignment of the system makes Brooklyn one of 74 divisions in the country, compared with an organization that placed it as one of 280 sectional centers. The division manager has expanded authority and more accountability, eliminating layers of bureaucracy which hindered, according to postal officials.Sanchez, who came from Guam in 1980, has a lifelong record with the postal service and most recently held the position of Acting General M anager for the New York International and Bulk Mail Service.At the conference where she was introduced last week, Sanchez was very much in charge of the proContinued on Page 3m
