Our Staff
Pastoral Search
While we wait for the Pastoral Search Committee to interview, discern, and eventually recommend a new settled pastor for us to call, we remind ourselves that we are not “on hold” as a church. We ARE the church! And we are enthusiastically continuing with all our current active ministries. We are delighted to announce that we will soon have a new “bridge pastor”, someone who will minister to us in the interval between now and our new settled pastor. He is unable to start with us until May, so for the remainder of March, we will have a few other pastors filling in until our new bridge pastor can begin. Our bridge pastor is Rev. Barry McCarthy who begins with us on May 1. May 7th will be his first Sunday with us.
Julie has served churches as a music director/minister of music in various capacities for more than 20 years, seeking out positions in the various parts of the country in which she has lived (New York, Michigan, and Minnesota). She and her family moved to Connecticut in 2017, where she was the Director of Music at First Church UCC in Granby before beginning at RHCC in 2021. In addition to her music ministry, Julie is the Director of Choirs at Choate Rosemary Hall, where she teaches Chamber Choir and Festival Chorus, in addition to other music electives. She started her teaching career as a public school music teacher, working at both the elementary and secondary levels for 11 years before transitioning to higher education where, as a professor of music education, she helped to prepare the next generation of music teachers. Originally from Rochester, New York, Julie received her Bachelor of Music and Master of Music from Ithaca College and her PhD in Music Education and Choral Conducting from Michigan State University.
Julie lives in Wallingford with her husband, Jordan, an elementary classroom teacher with the Hartford Public Schools, and their two children, Oliver and Kit. When not making or teaching music, Julie loves reading, traveling, and cheering on her beloved Buffalo Bills, New York Yankees, and Michigan State Spartans. She loves being a part of the RHCC community!
