PORT TOWNSEND — The Reverend Bruce A. Bode, senior minister at the Quimper Unitarian Universalist Fellowship since 2004, retired Sunday.
At church services that morning, Bode was honored with emeritus status, and that evening at the Jefferson County Fairgrounds more than 350 people celebrated Bode and his wife, Flossie, with speeches, music, a skit and a slide show.
The Rev. Helen Carroll, an accredited UU interim minister, has been hired to serve QUUF for the next two years.
She begins work in September, after serving as interim at Saltwater UU Church in Des Moines.
The Rev. Kate Lore will continue to serve as the assistant minister and provide continuity during the transition.
A new senior minister is expected to be called by September 2020.
Bode helped build the church both figuratively and literally, said Deb Carroll, congregational administrator, in a news release.
Since his arrival in 2004, QUUF has grown from 213 members to more than 400 members (and 200 affiliated friends), she said.
“He made QUUF a center for liberal religion as well as a place where community members could learn from one another,” Caroll added.
To accommodate expansion due to Bode’s leadership and QUUF’s openness to the entire Quimper Peninsula community, a new sanctuary was completed in 2010.
More than 10,000 hours of volunteer work was contributed to its construction.
Bode extended his ministry beyond the church.
He served on a rotating chaplaincy with the Jefferson County Ministerial Association, wrote a periodic column for the Peninsula Daily News, acted as a mentor to several ministerial interns throughout the years and participated as an active member of the Pacific Northwest Chapter of the Unitarian Universalist Ministers Association.
