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Seminarian & Intern

Seminarian, Katie Nakamura

My name is Katie Nakamura, and I am a student at Virginia Theological Seminary. I am originally from Birmingham, Alabama, and I lived in Chicago for four years while getting my bachelor’s degree in flute performance. At some point along the way, I sensed a call to the ordained ministry, and I started at VTS in 2008. As the seminarian here at Grace, my role is to learn about the weekly life of a church, through participating in services, meeting with my supervisor, John Graham, and reflecting on these experiences with a lay committee composed of people from the Grace congregation. During the two years that I will be at Grace, I will preach regularly and be involved with Grace’s Table, a Young Adult Bible Study, and other small groups and activities. I still love music, and my ministry here will include playing the flute for some of Grace's arts and outreach events. I look forward to spending the next year and a half here at Grace, and learning more about what it means to be a priest and proclaim the Gospel.

Katie Nakamura started at Grace in September, 2009.

Intern, Beth Frank

An Intern’s Sojourn at Grace

In 2005, someone asked me if I had ever considered seminary. I laughed and quickly made an improvident “never” statement. Over time “never” softened to a “hmmm?” that I couldn’t ignore: the proverbial mosquito caught inside my mosquito net. After discussions with others, some trial seminary classes, and spiritual direction, that mosquito was still bugging me. So I embarked on the Diocese of Washington’s discernment process for ordained ministry, a new one that started at my sponsoring parish, St. John’s-Lafayette Square, and then led me to Grace. The following e-mails to my Discernment Buddies (caveat: don’t leave home without them) recount aspects of my sojourn at Grace.

October 2007: Met with Bishop Chane and received the nod to move from “wanna be” to “nominee.” Next I am to meet the rectors of five possible internship parishes and select a parish.

November 2007: The rector visits were challenging: lots of different ideas about what an internship is and how it differs from a seminarian’s field placement. Great diversity of parishes-location, size, worship style, ministries, outreach priorities-yet the final choice was: Yankees or White Sox? The rector at Grace thinks of an intern as a “turbo charged layperson.” Works for me.

Advent 2007: Settling in at Grace. My car now autopilots over the Key Bridge on Sunday mornings. Really enjoy hearing the church bell ring about 10 minutes before the 10:30 service: a real call to worship. Different Eucharistic Prayers are used each week. The Prayers of the People vary and relate to the scripture and sermon. Some sound familiar. I wonder where they come from? The pace of the service is more relaxed than St. John’s. There’s a nice pause to reflect on the sermon, rather than race into the Nicene Creed.

My Discernment Committee held its first monthly meeting. At the end of the year, the Committee will submit a written report/evaluation of my call. I prefer to focus on my turbo charging which will include opportunities to serve as a reader, counter, communion minister, and server.

Lent 2008: Calling All Discernment Buddies! Are we all still afloat? I’ve been diving into the deep end of the pool with Evening Prayer: officiating, homilies, and leading a post-service discussion series. John gives some coaching and then just lets me dive in. These are new roles, yet related to things I have done in other contexts.

September 2008: Brother Bruce Neal (SSJE) calls ordinary time (Trinity Sunday to Advent) a time “to encounter the unexpected grace that comes from ordinary things, in ordinary ways.” He captures the richness of my internship, the community within the Gates of Grace and the light that radiates well beyond those gates. Equally fitting, another SSJE Brother calls ordinary time the “dog days of discipleship.” Those monthly discernment committee meetings can feel like an endless job interview. It is hard to keep a glad and grateful heart, open to finding where God may have snuck in a little grace.

October 2008: Entering the homestretch of my internship. All my paperwork is done. The COM interview is history. (Amazing how those Discernment Committee meetings helped prepare me for the interview.). In December, Bishop Chane will decide whether I am seminary-bound.

Soon with both joy and sadness I will exchange my “intern” label for a Friend of Grace tattoo. How did Grace become home so quickly? As my sojourn at Grace draws to a close, I feel a deeper understanding of Barbara Brown Taylor’s revelation: “My vocation was to love God and my neighbor, and that was something I could do anywhere, with anyone, with or without a collar. My priesthood was not what I did but who I was. In this new light, nothing was wasted. All that had gone before was blessing, and all yet to come was more.”

Beth’s internship drew to a close with a farewell service in November of 2008. Happily, though, she’s remained in DC to explore the next phase of her ministry, and we see her from time to time!