Saint Andrew’s Annual Meeting
Mark your calendars and join us for the first session of Saint Andrew’s Annual Parish Meeting, an important gathering in the life of our parish community. This session will take place on Sunday, December 8, during Coffee Hour in Trinity Commons following the 10:30 am service.
During this meeting, we will elect the incoming class of vestry members and our delegates to the 193rd Convention of the Diocese of Alabama. The nominees for vestry are:
Jack Drake
Bernard Hufft
Kyle McGucken
Dane Peterson
You can learn more about each nominee below.
Our nominees for delegates to Diocesan Convention are Kyle and Mikaela McGucken, and Jack and Rebecca Drake.
The Annual Parish Meeting is a time to reflect on the grace of God at work in our midst and to discern how the Spirit is leading us into the year ahead. It is also an opportunity to celebrate our shared life of fellowship, service, and prayer.
The second session of the Annual Parish Meeting, which will include ministry reports and a vote on the proposed budget for 2025, will be held on Sunday, February 2. Stay tuned for more details.
We hope you’ll join us as we seek to honor God’s call to our parish and look forward to the year ahead together.
Jack Drake
I graduated from the University of Alabama Law School in 1969 and went to work at the Selma Interreligious Project which was founded as a ministry in memory of Jonathan Daniels, who was murdered in 1965 in Lowndes County Alabama. The Selma Project was founded by Father Francis Walter, former Rector at Saint Andrew's. Deceased Saint Andrew's member Martha Jane Patton was also employed at the Selma Project. I lived in Tuscaloosa from 1969 until 1995, where I was an active member and former Senior Warden of Christ Church. I spend much of my time writing since my retirement in 2013 and have authored essays published in various books dealing with Alabama's Civil Rights history and am the author of "Be Not Afraid," a memoir forthcoming in 2025 from the University of Alabama Press. I am married to Rebecca Drake, also a former St Andrews Senior Warden.
Bernard Hufft
I have been a parishioner of Saint Andrew’s since 2011. A native of South Mississippi, I moved to Birmingham in April 2011, and currently reside in Hoover. I am a Territory Account Manager for a national sales and marketing company. Being part of the original team to create Saint Andy’s Pantry, I have been the director since 2022 and as well serve as an Acolyte and lector and am active with the Saint Aelred Guild and Saint Andrew’s Pride Committee. In 2010 I received my B.A. in Liberal Studies from the University of Mississippi with majors in English, History and Sociology. My passion is to help others who are on the fringes and especially providing assistance with outreach in those areas of hunger and literacy.
Kyle McGucken
Living in Alabama for the vast majority of my life, I have been primarily exposed to Evangelical Protestantism as the expression of the Christian faith. Be it Veggietales as a young child, A hyper Calvinist high school, and a Baptist University for higher education, The Episcopal church was only a term I heard in passing in relation to extended family or “those liberals”. Years passed as I subsequently graduated, entered the work force at Starbucks, met my now wife Mikaela, lead a union campaign that led in my firing, and found employment that brought me into contact with fellow Samford graduate and St. Andrews Chorister Leah Jones. Within these years, my relationship to Christianity and church going was at best cultural and at worst hostile. Having come to St Andrews, cliche as it may be, my entire life’s trajectory has been irrevocably altered. Through music, conversation, friendships, and love, this parish has truly become my home. I would be honored in any way to give back to those who have so graciously given to me.
Dane Peterson
My name is Dane Peterson. Most Sundays, you can find me sitting in the back pew next to Gerald or reading one of the lessons. I was born in Birmingham and have spent most of my life here, attending John Carroll Catholic and Birmingham-Southern. Since first stepping on the professional stage in 1987, the theatre has been my love language. My professional life has focused on education and advocacy as Theatre Director at John Carroll, Director of Production and Education at Birmingham Children’s Theatre, Program Director at the Southern AIDS Coalition, and currently as Director of Theatre Arts at Indian Springs School. I recently completed my MFA in Interdisciplinary Arts from Goddard College in Vermont. A couple of Sundays ago, I read both the Old Testament and Epistle at the 10:30 service. As I stepped away from the microphone for the psalms sung by the choir, I looked down at the wood floor of the pulpit and noticed how the varnish had worn down over the years. So much of this parish’s history is represented there within a 2’ x 2’ area - the sermons, eulogies, psalms, lectionaries, announcements, hymns - each summoning us, in their way, to be more like Christ. This is only one of the many reasons I came to St. Andrew’s in June 2021. I was a little lost, a little sad, a little needy, and this church opened its heart to me with the love of God. I am so thankful for that, and I hope that, by serving the next three years on the Vestry, I can return my appreciation to this parish in a small way.