The heart of a congregation is its many volunteers. However, the day-to-day operation of the church, the coordination of all the activities, and the lines of communication to the membership all fall to the staff. The Unitarian Universalist Church of Washington County is truly fortunate to have dedicated staff who work hard to meet the many needs of our church and membership.
Pastoral Care Minister – Danielle Garrett
Danielle Garrett is a candidate for Unitarian Universalist ministry. In addition to providing pastoral care at UUCCWC, she serves as the assistant minister at the First Unitarian Church of Portland. Danielle feels called to ground her work for justice in the rich fabric of congregational life and believes in a God of liberation and the transformative power of a good church potluck. Before following a call to ministry, Danielle spent ten years working in health care policy and advocacy in Washington D.C.
Danielle is also a pilgrimage scholar and enthusiast who has accompanied UU congregations on spiritual treks through Spain and Scotland. She graduated from Vanderbilt Divinity School, where she received the Founder’s Medal for first honors. She holds a B.A. from The College of William and Mary and a Master of Public Affairs from the University of Texas. She currently lives in Portland with her wife Mari and her dog, Jo March.
Choir Director/Accompanist – Luna Thompson-Aue
Luna (she/they) has been playing piano since she was 6 years old, and along the way has picked up organ, violin, bass guitar, drumkit, and of course singing. After spending a decade as an accompanist for many different community and church choirs, Luna picked up a great deal of valuable information on how to lead and conduct choirs from the wide variety of conductors that she worked for. With the encouragement of church leadership, she saw an opportunity to try her own hand at conducting with the skilled and compassionate choir here at UUCCWC. When she isn’t excitedly teaching the choir something new about music theory, pushing them to new musical experiences, or accompanying the congregation in song on organ or piano, Luna loves to spend time at home with her cat and partner in West Portland.
RE Coordinator – Christine Hinderer
Originally from California, Christine has been a member of the UUCCWC congregation since moving to Hillsboro in 2007. Christine has a degree in literature from UC Santa Cruz. She has work experience in accounting and in print production. Attention to details, creative graphic design, and clear writing skills are useful and important skills for a religious exploration and education coordinator. Christine’s young son participates in the religious education classes. Christine believes church community can be beneficial for all children and works to include all children in religious exploration and education. Christine is active in the choir and enjoys the church book group. Christine’s hobbies include knitting, crochet and cross stitching.
Office Administrator – Tanya Vesecky
Tanya serves as both the office administrator and bookkeeper. The office is open from 10am-2pm, Tuesday-Friday at the Parish House. The office phone is 503-648-1720.
