ONE of the things I like about my friend Rev. John Helt’s new church, - and I should put 'new' in quotes, for St Paul’s United Church of Christ in the wooded hills on St. Augustine Rd. near Hubertus WI was founded in 1880, church built in 1890 – is that he, having happily accepted their church’s call as their full-time pastor, got a cemetery with that..........On July Fourth, the raccoon entourage was invited to be the Helts’ very first guests, at a breakfast brunch served on the deck of the small and historic rustic cabin they have taken, on the Hogsback Road. They moved in only a week ago. (John married us Nov 11, 1983 at Friedens UCC, Milwaukee.) After basking in the charm of the rustically-hewn dwelling, enlarged, that I personally have enjoyed riding past and admiring from the Hogsback Road on scenic drives through the Holy Hill area during the fall colors, for decades before John Helt was ever known to me, we then took a tour of the nearby church.
From the front, it looks like a church that a Sunday School-attending kindergartener would draw. White, with a steeple, and the door in the center. But from the side, in the spacious parking lot, the truth of the structure in its present incarnation is disclosed. An addition offers a covered main entry and rooms for meetings and offices. The church, up and down, is 'what's happening now' modernized without sacrificing any of the history and its architectural features.
John’s study, with the yet unsettled books and various memorabilia with which he travels, including a picture of a man paddling a coracle, is taking settled form. His giant and battered Bible Concordance is among the many books stacked on the floor for now, awaiting the order of bookshelves.
It occurs to me that a church with an attached cemetery, with gravesites going back to the late 1800s, has a permanence that transcends temporal weather changes and deflections, and assures that St. Paul's is going to continue lasting. It is anchored by the well-tended graves of many dear forbears. Now, they have Dr. John Helt to till their pastoral garden in the coming years.
One sunny day during his first week on the job, John met a watercolorist sitting in a back corner of the cemetery, doing a sketch of the church with the cemetery in the foreground.
John says ‘I love it here.’ So says his wife and longtime faithful partner, Cindy.
It occurs to me that a church with an attached cemetery, with gravesites going back to the late 1800s, has a permanence that transcends temporal weather changes and deflections, and assures that St. Paul's is going to continue lasting. It is anchored by the well-tended graves of many dear forbears. Now, they have Dr. John Helt to till their pastoral garden in the coming years.
One sunny day during his first week on the job, John met a watercolorist sitting in a back corner of the cemetery, doing a sketch of the church with the cemetery in the foreground.
John says ‘I love it here.’ So says his wife and longtime faithful partner, Cindy.
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