Getting Involved We value our involvement as individuals and as a congregation in issues of importance to society at large. We have used our large building to house many groups including Restorative Justice Community Action, theater groups, other congregations, and local activists. We structure ourselves in Ministry Teams. These teams are passion-driven. If you are passionate about it, we empower you to do it. This is where the Spirit is most active and obvious. Our Ministry Teams include a knitting group, the Worship Planning Team, various study groups, the garden team, the Loaves and Fishes meal program, and so on. You do not have to be a member of the church to be on a ministry team. We want people to be involved in ministry. Go for it! a welcoming and affirming church UBC has a long history of inclusion of all people. We have been actively welcoming and affirming of the LGBTQ community since the early 1980's. We welcome the opportunity to walk and work alongside everyone and anyone who seeks to live out the Gospel of peace, justice and love. We have been celebrating same-sex weddings in our church building for decades and worked hard to make marriage equality a reality in Minnesota. As a piece of history, check out our statement on marriage passed in 2004. We are a founding member church of the Association of Welcoming and Affirming Baptists . In 1991, we were the first American Baptist Church to call an openly lesbian pastor, Nadean Bishop. She served with distinction until her retirement in 2000. In 2005, our Pastor received the Breaking the Silence Award from the University of MN for his work on behalf of the LGBT community. GayChurch.org Sister Church in Leon, Nicaragua UBC established a sister-church relationship with Second Baptist Church of Leon, Nicaragua in 1992 under the guidance of Rev. Dr. Nadean Bishop. Second Baptist Church runs a preK-11th grade school, attached to their church building, consisting of approximately 132 children. Each year we raise money for scholarships for students attending this school which we call the God-Parent Program. We have more recently augmented this relationship with the advent of e-mail correspondence and visits by delegations going both ways! Delegations from UBC visited Nicaragua in 2003, 2010, 2014, and 2023. Doug Donley and Deidre Druk visited Nicaragua with members of The Baptist Peace Fellowship of North America in 2008 and the UBC Bell Choir visited and performed there in 2013. In addition, members Jean Lubke and Deidre Druk visited, each independently: Deidre in 2012 and Jean in 2011 and 2018. We sponsored five members of our Sister Church to visit Minnesota in 2008, 2011, 2014, and 2017. We try to make a visit every year and a half, but the unrest in Nicaragua and the pandemic have hindered our visits since 2018. The delegation that was to travel from Nicaragua to visit us in Minneapolis in the Fall of 2023 was not granted travel visas by the U.S. Embassy in Managua. These visits are a powerful exchange. They deepen our relationships and open our eyes to different cultures. We have deep ties to our friends in Nicaragua! Deidre Druk coordinates this ministry team. If you would like to go on a UBC-sponsored mission trip, you may be eligible for a travel scholarship. You can request a scholarship application from Deidre Druk , or at the church office. Check out our Sister Church's Facebook page . Partners University Baptist Church has a long history of working for social justice, starting with its involvement in the abolition movement in the 1850s. Members and friends of UBC volunteer their time, talents, and resources in a number of vital ministries, working against poverty and homelessness and advocating for gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgendered people. Our affiliations and outreach include: Alliance of Baptists American Baptist Churches of the Rochester/Genesee Region of New York State American Baptist Churches, USA Association of Welcoming and Affirming Baptists Baptist Peace Fellowship of North America: An ecumenical Baptist organization committed to peacemaking and justice-seeking in the US and throughout the world. We are one of about 50 partner congregations with the BPFNA. Many of us attend their annual Summer Conferences as well as the international friendship tours to foster peace and nonviolence. First Congregational Church of Minnesota (FCC): A UCC church near UBC that we partner regularly with on joint services, activism, and social groups. Interfaith Campus Coalition (ICC) : A coalition of campus ministries at the University of Minnesota. UBC is a part of ICC because of its commitment to interfaith dialog, its respect for diversity and religious pluralism, and its efforts to develop a code of ethics for campus ministries that allows religious communities to have a meaningful presence at the University while respecting the boundaries between church and state. Restorative Justice Community Action: Working to reduce repeat offenders, reduce crime overall and strengthen and build community. Soulforce: Members participate in the local and national Soulforce organizations committed to working for justice on behalf of gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender persons using nonviolent tactics. We share our building with many organizations and movements including: Sacred Harp Singers NAMI (National Alliance on Mental Illness) Party for Socialism and Liberation

OUR PASTOR I'm a paragraph. Click here to add your own text and edit me. It’s easy. Just click “Edit Text” or double click me and you can start adding your own content and make changes to the font. Feel free to drag and drop me anywhere you like on your page. I’m a great place for you to tell a story and let your users know a little more about you. This is a great space to write long text about your company and your services. You can use this space to go into a little more detail about your company. Talk about your team and what services you provide. Tell your visitors the story of how you came up with the idea for your business and what makes you different from your competitors. Make your company stand out and show your visitors who you are. At Wix we’re passionate about making templates that allow you to build fabulous websites and it’s all thanks to the support and feedback from users like you! Keep up to date with New Releases and what’s Coming Soon in Wixellaneous in Support. Feel free to tell us what you think and give us feedback in the Wix Forum. OUR CHURCH I'm a paragraph. Click here to add your own text and edit me. It’s easy. Just click “Edit Text” or double click me and you can start adding your own content and make changes to the font. Feel free to drag and drop me anywhere you like on your page. I’m a great place for you to tell a story and let your users know a little more about you. This is a great space to write long text about your company and your services. You can use this space to go into a little more detail about your company. Talk about your team and what services you provide. Tell your visitors the story of how you came up with the idea for your business and what makes you different from your competitors. Make your company stand out and show your visitors who you are. At Wix we’re passionate about making templates that allow you to build fabulous websites and it’s all thanks to the support and feedback from users like you! Keep up to date with New Releases and what’s Coming Soon in Wixellaneous in Support. Feel free to tell us what you think and give us feedback in the Wix Forum. JOIN US Upcoming Worship learn more ONLINE GIVING learn more

Rev. Doug Donley Announces retirement JANUARY 11, 2026 After 25 years of ministry at UBC, Doug Donley has announced his retirement. interim pastor reverend dr. cody j. sanders On behalf of the Search Committee, we are very pleased to announce that our Interim Pastor will be the Reverend Dr. Cody J. Sanders. As Rev. Sanders has a full-time position as the associate professor of congregational and community care and leadership at Luther Seminary, he will be working at UBC on a part-time basis, beginning June 1st. We also hired Brittany Monson-Moffatt as pastoral associate to the interim to help with pastoral duties during this transition. Rev. Sanders comes with many strong skills and talents to help us move forward and prepare for our next settled pastor. Prior to Luther, he served as pastor to UBC's sibling American Baptist congregation, Old Cambridge Baptist Church in Cambridge, Massachusetts, where he was also American Baptist Chaplain to Harvard University and Advisor for LGBTQ+ Affairs in the Office of Religious, Spiritual, and Ethical Life at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. In 2024/2025, he served as interim pastor of The Table in Minneapolis during a pastoral transition. Cody has previously served on the board of UBC's partner organizations, the Association of Welcoming and Affirming Baptists and the BPFNA ~ Bautistas por la Paz, and was the founding co-convener of the Racial Justice & Multiculturalism Community in the Alliance of Baptists. He has published a number of books on congregational ministry, LGBTQ+ concerns, and spiritual care. Cody is originally from South Carolina and now lives in the Hamline-Midway neighborhood of Saint Paul with his partner, also named Cody, and their puppy, Captain. lavender magazine "the bones of university baptist" Rev. Doug Donley talked to journalist Noah Mitchell about his 30+ years at the pulpit, including 25 at UBC, in advance of his retirement. “In these past several months, we’ve really seen, the Twin Cities step up and model what I think the best of what Christianity can be, whether they’re Christian or not, in terms of loving neighbor, being a moral center, and being brave and connected with folks,” he says. Read the Article dear members and friends of university baptist church: This past weekend, we celebrated the 25th anniversary of the date of your selection of me as your pastor. After much prayerful discernment, I’m writing to let you know of my intention to retire from active ministry, effective May 31, 2026. As most of you know, my wife Kim retired four years ago. Since that time, I have had a major medical scare that you lovingly saw me through. While I feel relatively fine, it reinforced my belief that my time is precious. I want to travel and have adventures while my energy and health are intact. Deciding when to leave has been very hard. I love the people of UBC and the ministry that we have shared. There are initiatives that we’ve completed and some that are just getting underway. I have every confidence that UBC is and will continue to be a creative and courageous community rooted in justice and working for peace, as you have been for over 175 years. I’ve been honored and humbled to have played a small part in our ongoing story. I expect the coming months to be a time when we continue to celebrate this wonderful community. The council is working with our denominational leaders to secure interim leadership. As part of my covenant with you, I will abide by the American Baptist Minister’s Council Code of Ethics which states in part: “upon my resignation or retirement, I will discontinue my ministerial leadership roles with my former constituents and will not make ministerial contacts in the field of another ministerial leader without request and/or consent.” In practical matters, this means that I will cease to contact people that I know from UBC for up to two years, including social media. I won’t be available for weddings, funerals, dedications or baptisms. This is not intended to diminish the deep friendships that we have, but to enable the congregation to fully embrace new leadership. I’ll be your biggest cheerleader from afar. Again, I want to thank you for nurturing me and my family over these 25 years. I am immensely proud of the ministry we have shared. I look forward to continuing to connect with each of you in the coming months. Blessings and Peace, Doug Donley the calling of pastor douglas mcleish donley reflections from the search committee chair by paula moyer PART I: Never Say “Maybe” to a Nominating Committee September, 2000 “I don’t feel that I can make a move until we hear from Doug Donley.” These words, spoken by a member of our pastoral search committee, ended up changing the whole course of our quest. We were more than a year into the venture. But before we get to that point, some background is needed. April, 1999 All of us started off a bit reluctantly: some taking on yet another big deal in an already busy schedule, some (like me) wondering why anyone would think we were qualified for such a pursuit. One night in the early spring, I got a phone call from a member of the nominating committee (the name at the time for what we now call the Time and Talent Team). “Would you consider being on the pastoral search committee?” I put the phone to my ear while I propped myself up in bed. Pastor Nadean Bishop had just announced her retirement. Truth be told, I was thinking about my toothache. No, I mused to myself while trying to listen to the nominating committee member. I should definitely not be able to count my pulse from my tooth . “I’m sorry. I can’t make a decision tonight,” I begged off. “I’m getting a root canal in the morning.” She would not be deterred. “Well, how about I call you tomorrow night?” I had been on this same committee some years before. We, too, had to put together a pastoral search team when Lee Freeman announced his retirement. I knew the pressure. “Okay.” I knew it as soon as I said it. To a nominating committee member, anything other than a flat-out “no” comes down to “yes.” She had checked off a box, and now my fate was sealed. Soon our committee convened: Don Dresser, congregation president, was on there as “ex officio” – by the nature of his title. Others were Harriet Johnson, Howard Johnson, John Medeiros, Nancy Myers, and Denise Roy. We pondered the onerous task ahead of us: Hire an interim pastor, ponder pastoral candidates, and call someone. All in the midst of preparing for the church’s sesquicentennial (150th) celebration. Some members were even clamoring for a fast process, so that we could have a new pastor called and installed as part of these festivities. Some were wondering if we could afford a fulltime pastor. Others, speaking for the “Burnout Committee,” wanted a strong leader to take the helm. It seemed that we couldn’t make a move without disappointing someone. As if all that weren’t enough, we got word that serving on a pastoral search committee was itself a burnout experience. Five years from now, we were cautioned, half of us would no longer be members of UBC. We pondered that warning as if it were the Gospel. Our committee had an initial meeting with our denominational support: Diane Ehr, our area minister representing churches in the Twin Cities, and Gary Grogan, our regional minister (our region consisted of Iowa and Minnesota at the time). Diane lived in town, and Gary drove up from the headquarters in Des Moines. He was on the verge of retirement, but wanted to protect “welcoming and affirming” congregations like ours from those who thought we were the anti-Christ. Diane and Gary presented us with the materials we needed from Valley Forge, Pennsylvania, which is kind of like Vatican City to American Baptists. It was like personal ads, except no one was expressing any interest in walks on the beach and wine before a fire. These were the files of ordained ABC ministers who had indicated that they were in the job market – what their strengths were, and what they were looking for. Our denominational support ministers helped us to understand that congregational survey findings were only one way to understand the needs of our people. We needed to consider the survey results in the context of what we knew. For example, responses may indicate a desire for a pastor who delegates, but those responses are coming from a church with a “burnout committee.” We were also cautioned against the pressure to find and install a new pastor quickly. We needed to decide whether we should do our search process quickly or do it right, and that we may not be able to do both. A particular concern was the idea of calling the new pastor right in time for the sesquicentennial. This may be difficult for the new pastor, who would be just getting to know the congregation, and have to listen to everyone talking about how great all the pastors were in the past. Truth be told, that guidance was a relief. We could take our collective feet off the accelerator. All we had to do was sift through the files, let Diane know if we needed more prospects, rank them, interview them, and present a candidate. All… Once we got to the point of presenting a candidate, we were advised to only offer one. Proposing more than one in the spirit of democracy would confuse and divide the congregation. Some of our members, like Howard, had extensive human resources experience. We were quickly seeing, though, that calling a pastor was not a hiring task. We were looking for the person who would be present with us in our collective and individual celebrations and griefs: someone who would dedicate our infants, marry us and our grown children, and walk in the dark with us when we said goodbye to loved ones, either by death or by divorce. “We need to be working hand in hand with the Holy Spirit,” someone said. Howard commented that we needed to pray every time we met, and to ask the congregation to pray for us, too. He may have had the secular experience, but he quickly discerned the difference. Nancy and Harriet had the history of being “PK’s” or “preacher’s kids.” They knew better than any among us the pressures that a pastor’s family faces and the support we would need to provide. At the time, I was working as a freelance journalist. I was remarkably unqualified to serve on any committee that had something to do with interviewing and hiring. Yet when no one stepped up to be chair, I said, “I will do it if you understand that I’ve never done this before and that I will do it imperfectly.” That was good enough for my committee members. Now there was no going back. I vowed to do everything to avoid burning ourselves out. Soon after this meeting, Denise announced that during her sabbatical, which started in the fall, she would be spending the first semester in Indonesia, primarily in Java, with frequent jaunts to Bali. We needed to figure out how to keep in touch. Fortunately, our “new” technology – email! – would both keep us from burning out from excessive meetings and keep Denise current. PART II: The Candidate and “Heather” September, 2000 FAST FORWARD to that moment of truth I mentioned earlier. There we sat in Harriet’s living room, feeling that we were at a standstill. We had sifted through each prospect’s résumé. We had poured over the materials sent by those on the short list. We felt stalled out. We had heard back from all of the prospects we had contacted. Except one. Where was that preacher from San Francisco in all this? “I don’t feel that I can make a move until we hear from Doug Donley.” Those were Harriet’s game-changing words. “Neither can I,” said Nancy. This pastor of a small rebel church in San Francisco sounded interesting but had fallen off the grid. Maybe the prospect of a Minnesota winter was scaring him off? We had to find out for sure, so the committee asked me to call him. I figured the best time to do this was on a Sunday afternoon. And he was home! “Oh, I’m so glad you called.” This would be my first conversation with Doug, and he sounded a little sheepish. “My computer was infected by the Melissa Virus [the computer virus making its rounds back then].” Next he asked me to disregard the background noise of what sounded like a crime in progress. “My wife is out of town and I’m home with our daughters.” The sounds were refreshing. We had had two pastors in a row retire from the pulpit and one retiree filling in as interim. A young pastor with little kids? The idea was appealing. Doug then committed to sending the materials we were asking for. I don’t remember what they were, but we liked them enough to invite him up for a next step: an interview and preaching at a “neutral pulpit.” We also arranged for Denise, our Indonesia correspondent, to have phone time with Doug. John Medeiros navigated the logistics of a conference call across hemispheres during a trip to Washington, DC. The trick was to find a time when all three parties were awake. (I mean physically “awake.” The term “woke” for “progressive” was not yet in use.) Denise was many hours ahead and across the International Dateline, while Doug was two hours behind us in San Francisco. John was on Eastern time in DC. The call went well – it lasted over two hours. Denise supported our “next step.” Diane Ehr would arrange for another church to allow our prospect to serve as a guest preacher, and we would come to that church to hear him preach and to visit more afterward. November, 2000 ON THE SATURDAY MORNING of our interview weekend, I picked up Doug and his wife Kim at a house in Vadnais Heights. It turned out that Doug’s brother lived in town, so a calling to the Twin Cities was seen as a plus to this pastor from California. We met at Nancy Myers’s home for bagels, coffee, and a time for us all to get to know each other. All was laughter and smiles. In a secular hiring process, the spouse would not be part of the interview. And we were quite clear that “pastor’s wife” was not a job at our church. But there were good reasons to have the spouse along. This was a 24/7 job. Did this prospect’s family life have sufficient “shock absorbers” to deal with weekend/dead-of-night pastoral care? They would both have to love us to put up with that. There was another reason. “Watch how this preacher treats his wife.” This sage advice came from Phyllis, the wife of the pastor I had had in high school. She spoke plain Oklahoma sense. “Is he ugly to his wife? That’s a problem, because that’s the person he should be the nicest to of all.” I didn’t know what I expected to see in this short weekend, but I saw no “ugliness.” We learned that they met because Kim, five years older, had been the babysitter for Doug and his three siblings after her older sister quit. Of course, they reconnected again years later as adults, but the origin story was priceless. After lunch, Kim left with her in-laws. The afternoon was time to drill down. Would Doug be able to stand us? Compatibility with our music program was an easy yes. Doug had minored in music in college and continued his interests; Kim was a music therapist and a classical composer. They would anticipate joining the choir, and maybe the handbell choir, too. Our congregation’s “welcoming and affirming” stance was Doug’s own. We found out that he had had to go through three ordination councils before getting approval. The first two refused him because he was asked if he considered homosexuality a sin, and each time he said no. And then we drilled even farther down. “How are you at conflict, Doug?” I was thinking of a few cantankerous souls among our congregation that had given Pastor Nadean no small amount of grief. The poor guy’s eyes bugged out, as if I had invited him to walk on live coals. “That’s not a thing I enjoy.” He said something like that. I remember the look more than the actual words. Then he discussed general Biblical principles: discourage gossip and “tattling” to the pastor, encourage direct resolution of the parties. There was nothing canned in that awkward but sincere response. We gave him a pass. I think someone said what I was thinking. “We wouldn’t want a pastor that likes conflict.” And then a laugh of relief. I found myself thinking that, in general, most people who felt called to parish ministry didn’t seek discord. We would meet again the next morning at the church donating the “neutral pulpit.” THE “NEUTRAL PULPIT,” we learned from Diane, had replaced the dreaded sight of a “pulpit committee” barging into a sanctuary in the middle of services. Total strangers, entering together but sitting separately, told a congregation that their pastor was looking for another job. Even so, she warned, the cat might start slipping out of the bag. The next morning, when we all drove up to the Church of the Neutral Pulpit, we were first struck by how much we coveted its parking lot. With Dinkytown parking at a premium, we were used to a vigorous quest for parking spots, but here we just drove up. Doug and Kim were there, along with Harriet Johnson. When the service started, I was seated by Doug and Kim. I remember that I sang alto and he sang tenor. And then came the opening prayer. “Dear Lord,” the pastor intoned, “Please be with Reverend Donley and University Baptist Church as they consider calling him to be their minster.” Well, so much for confidentiality, I thought. “And bless him and his wife Heather and give them travel mercies for their trip back to San Francisco.” Heather? I put a knuckle in my mouth to keep from giggling. The sermon came and went, and it was fine. That part is a bit of a blur. We were all aware that the host congregation had posters on its bulletin board that reflected a more conservative outlook, and Doug’s sermon was anything but that. Yet the congregants came up and shook his hand and wished him well. Our time with Doug and Kim ended with lunch at a nearby restaurant. The details of that meal escape me as well. I don’t know if it was pizza or sandwiches, or a regular restaurant with choices. And I don’t remember our goodbye. I do remember this: I was certain that I had found my pastor: not just someone who would deliver engaging sermons and be a good team player amongst all the players of our strong-willed congregants. I was also looking for that person I could trust to walk with me in the dark. When our committee reconvened, we who had been present were of one mind. We had found our pastoral candidate. Now there was another “next step”: find out what Denise was thinking. PART III: From Candidate to Pastor November, 2000 WE EMAILED DENISE and set up a time that we could talk to her, which was the following Saturday night. In this pre-Zoom world, it had not been possible to include her in the interview weekend. We needed to know what she was thinking. In between the two meetings, I squeezed in my first cataract surgery and a phone call to Doug the night before to let him know our plans. When I mentioned my upcoming surgery, he immediately asked the right question: “Do you want me to pray for you?” I said yes, and he did so right there over the phone. A few days later, our committee met at Howard Johnson’s house. In this time before cell phones had become the norm, Howard’s house was the one place with enough jacks and phones for us all to gather around. We arranged ourselves throughout the rooms in his house and called Denise. After we convened with a prayer, we talked about where we were at. When we were ready, I asked for a motion to present Doug as our pastoral candidate. Denise sent her “I move” statement across the Pacific Ocean and Great Plains to us in the Twin Cities. Someone seconded, and the vote was unanimous. Now we had a new next step: to invite Doug and Kim back to the Twin Cities, along with their girls, for a “candidate weekend.” After I called him later that night, we set the date for January 6, Epiphany Sunday. I announced our decision in “Joys and Concerns” at church the next day. Because no decision had been made and because Doug was still a pastor at another church, we asked the congregation to keep the information confidential – a big ask for a whole church, I know. The weekend would start with a dinner and huddle with the search committee. Over the next few days, Doug would meet as many of the other church committees and groups as possible. The weekend would culminate with his preaching and a business meeting held during forum after services. After the forum, the congregation would vote on the call. January, 2001 December flew by, and soon my husband and I were at the airport on the Thursday night before Candidate Weekend. In those days before 9/11 (actually just months before), we stood at the gate looking for this young family of four. The girls practically bounced out of the airplane. Two-year-old Becca insisted on pushing her own stroller through the concourse. We brought the family first to their hotel. Amanda ran immediately toward the nightstand and pulled out the Gideon Bible. “This is a great story!” she announced to Dan and me. Score one for teaching their children Biblical literacy! We then proceeded to dinner at John’s house. Dan watched the girls while our committee huddled with Doug and Kim. At dinner we learned that they were coping with a cosmetic drama concerning their four-year-old, Amanda. For complicated reasons, she had been in the middle of a do-it-herself haircut before she was caught. She had whacked off a hunk of hair center-front. Try as she might, Kim had not found a solution, nor had her hairdresser. We on the committee sympathized. The haircut was a glimpse into their lives, a family with boisterous young children. For the following two days, Doug’s schedule was packed pretty tightly, from earnest committees to the homes of elderly ladies serving tea. I was his ride for part of Saturday. I noticed that he had quickly adopted the Minnesota custom of taking his shoes off at the door. I SERVED AS THE WORSHIP LEADER the next day. As Doug and I perched ourselves up front for the prelude, our attention was drawn to the balcony, where the choir sat at that time in our church life. Just over the railing, a little blond head with a spiked hairdo peered down at the sanctuary. Amanda had found the “catbird seat,” and was taking it all in. Close at hand was Megan Dahlberg. (Megan is a renowned professor of early child development at the University of Minnesota, and also has a magic touch with young children.) She had volunteered to help with the Donley kids during the service. There are few things I remember about Doug’s sermon that day, except for this one thing. He talked about visiting his family home in Cleveland Heights, years after his parents’ divorce. As if he had shown us a photo, I can still see that backyard. It was a fragile picture, one with cracks. A broken swing set comes to mind, but I could be mistaken. With that picture, Doug showed us that he was fragile, too. When communion time came, there was some hesitation, some unattended logistics. Jan Curtis appeared, quietly and unobtrusively, and set things right. Next came forum, with questions upon questions. Although the focus was on Doug, the congregation also wanted to know something about Kim. They learned about her professional background, and Doug talked about her being his best friend, the first person he went to for advice. And now it was time for the business meeting, a discussion, and the time to vote on the call. Doug and Kim gathered up the girls. This California family went out into the cold and headed for the Pizza Hut across the street. Diane Ehr and her husband Alan joined them. Our church members peppered our committee with still more questions. Did he have enough experience? Could his family withstand the 24/7 life? Would he work well with our committees? “Look, he will be new to us, and we will be new to him,” Bill Allen said. “He will make mistakes, and so will we. At some point, we will have to trust a new pastor, whether it’s Doug or someone else.” Once all the questions on the table were answered, Don as president asked for a motion, which I had prepared. “I move that University Baptist Church call Reverend Doug Donley to be our pastor.” Someone quickly seconded the motion. Then there was a kerfuffle about how the vote should ensue. To make sure that no one felt pressured, we decided on a secret ballot. People were to vote the motion up with a “yes,” down with a “no,” or “abstain.” Two volunteers then collected and counted the ballots. The result was unanimous: 97 voted “yes.” No one voted “no,” and there were no abstentions. Without even putting on a coat on this January day in Minnesota, I trotted across the street to Pizza Hut, as fast as my high heels would allow. The Donleys were in the back with the Ehrs. “Doug, University Baptist Church, in a secret ballot, has unanimously called you to be our pastor,” I announced to him in as official a tone as I could. “Do you accept our call?” Without hesitation, Doug said, “Yes, I do.” We all then rushed back to the fellowship hall, where the voters were waiting. “Doug has accepted our call,” I announced. “This is our new pastor.” Everyone clapped, and he stepped into that role immediately. At Doug’s suggestion, we joined hands and sang the first verse of “Blessed Be the Tie.” Epilogue March, 2026 AND SO BEGAN OUR 25-year walk with Reverend Douglas McLeish Donley. Speaking for myself, he has married both of my sons and supported me after the deaths of my parents and during a divorce. He has prayed for me at every surgery I have had. I know he has seen many of us through these milestones and more: baby dedications, baptisms, and funerals. He has been with our church for events involving our congregation, our metropolitan area, our nation, and our world, most recently during the ICE Out protests. He has shepherded UBC while living his own life, too. The rambunctious preschoolers have grown into poised women with advanced degrees. The choir has sung several of Kim’s compositions, and she is often at the keyboards or other instruments. They both sing in the choir, and Doug is also in the handbell choir. He frequently bursts into song in the middle or at the end of a sermon, or both. The whole Donley family, in various roles, saw us through the early days of COVID with online services. Throughout it all, Pastor Doug has been steady at the helm – as the old hymn says, “in our joys and in our sorrows, days of toil and hours of ease.” We started out separately, as a congregation and a candidate presented by a committee. The transformation started quickly, as soon as Doug accepted our call. It continued through the years that followed. Using “the ties that bind,” God stitched us into a family. The Calling