Steve and Kathy Thomason's first Sunday at Saint Mark's, Seattle, was September 2, 2012. The community of Saint Mark's Seattle recognizes with joy and gratitude ten years of their presence in this place, and of Steve's leadership of the cathedral community.
Everyone is invited to add their voice to the community's expression of thanks by leaving a comment of any length, at the bottom of this post.
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40 Responses
Barbara J Erickson
Gratitude for your being called amongst us 10 years ago! You each bring and share special gifts with this Saint Mark’s community, and I feel blessed to be a part of this community with you! Blessing and peace to you both, bje
Carmen, Matt & Dani Brady
Steve and Kathy, thank you so much for your leadership and significant contributions within our community… we feel blessed to have you here! We hope your first ten years are the beginning of many more years at St. Mark’s.
Tina Blondino
What a vibrant and inclusive place St. Mark’s is! Thanks, Steve, for your guidance and leadership.
Stuart Ainsley
Steve, congratulations to you and Kathy for your ten years at St Marks. We have all been blessed by your leadership and stewardship. I look forward to spending the next ten years under your leadership.
Stuart Ainsley
Marv Waschke
Steve– The first sermon I heard you preach on livestream brought me to Saint Marks. I heard a genuine Christian voice that promised a future for the doctrinaire, chaotic, and contentious world of the 21st century, a voice that brought together God and reason, Christ and compassion, the Holy Spirit and rejuvenation. I am so grateful and we are so blessed.
Maria O Tapias
Congratulations!
Fred Northup
Steve,
As I have said many times to many people (including yourself!), I am so pleased to see all the wonderful and varied things that continue to occur and evolve by the people of St Mark’s under your leadership! I hope to get to know Kathy one day because I am sure she plays an indelible role in all that you are able to do! I hope that you are able to understand and feel in your inmost self the sense of gratitude we all have for you!
Fred Northup
Sandy Nelson
We are grateful for your leadership at Saint Mark’s — we started coming on Sunday mornings when Elsie joined the Junior Chorister choir in 2013 — little did we know then what an important part of our lives Saint Mark’s would become in the years ahead! We are richly blessed by all the varied experiences we have had and are grateful for the church family we have there. Here’s to 10 more years or more!
Martha Craig
Thank you, for all you two do to make St Marks such a vibrant and welcoming place. From literally keeping the walls from falling down to melting the Seattle freeze with Radix and other small groups to attracting a deep bench of first-rate homilists, you’ve spearheaded significant and exciting change here. I’m very thankful for your ministry and wish you many more years at St Marks.
Michael Lloyd
Thank you both for making St. Mark’s the truly hopeful and inspiring place where our community can flourish. In a troubled and disturbing world, St. Mark’s continues to be a light shining in the darkness.
Congratulations for an amazing decade..
Carolyn J Woodward
When Laurie and I were still living in Albuquerque, we made St. Mark’s our parish home the first time we visited via livestream and experienced, Steve, your warm and thoughtful leadership. We participated every week in the coffee hour and enjoyed meeting you, Kathy, and appreciating your sense of humor (I especially recall your giggles on the day I brought our pooch Millie on-screen! We know how blessed we are, and we look forward to a rich and beautiful next ten years! Carolyn Woodward and Laurie Burdick
Pearl McElheran
We are equally blessed in you both. Thank you.
Mary Bayne
You are both such gifts to Saint Mark’s in so many ways and to me personally. Thank you for being with us for ten years.
Mary Bayne
Karla Koon
Grateful for all that you both have brought to St. Mark’s and the broader community. I am glad that our paths crossed and for your presence in my journey. Blessings for many more years of ministry!
Deborah Anderson
How blessed are we all by the last ten years! Gratitude for all you have brought and given. Every good blessing for many more years.🕊(when my heart is full it defaults to platitudes😂- arriving as you arrived has been a miraculous, life giving blessing. Thank you🙏)
Theresa Marinelli
Thanks to you both for your gentle strength and courageous leadership during the past ten years.
I appreciate the transformative power of your words and they have been a source of inspiration to me.
We at St. Mark’s are blessed to have you!
Betsy Bell
Steve, as one of the elders at the Beacon on the Hill, I was curious to see how the 5th Dean under my watch as a parishioner would pull us all into a new relationship through your “mutual Ministry” and fiscal transparency. What a joy it has been to be part of a congregation whose leadership builds program based on tangible means. I appreciate your determination to welcome all people to the Table while preaching a unitive theology and a clear call for justice. It’s been a compassionate balancing act. The creation of Radix and the Wisdom school speaks to my longing for the voices and teaching I had found only outside the church. I am so glad you find your work–yours and Kathy’s–nourishing your own journeys. I am full of gratitude that you both plan to continue to walk with all of us for the foreseeable future. Thanks be to God. Betsy Bell
Carla Golden
Congratulations on this wonderful anniversary of service to the cathedral!
Best wishes for the future!
Pr. John-Otto Liljenstolpe
Dear Steve, as one of many not formally a member of the St. Mark’s community, I give thanks for the leadership and inspiration you have offered the wider Christian community in Seattle. In a time when the image of Christianity offered the public is all too often a perversion of the Gospel, I give thanks for the community of St. Mark’s who under your leadership continually presents the people of Seattle and Washington State with an image of Christian discipleship that clearly reflects the faithfulness we all are called to.
Kathleen Nyhuis
You are a very spectacular, loving, and effective partnership. Thank you for all you have shared with the Cathedral family. We are blessed to have you among us. Congratulations on 10 years! Thanking God always for you both.
Kathleen
René Marceau
Congratulations on your 10th anniversary at St. Mark’s!
Pat Taylor
A decade of devotion, erudition, kindness, encouragement from both if you. It has been a blessed 10 years.
Thank you.
Laura saunders
Thank you for your compassionate leadership. May you have many more years ahead as part of this fantastic community inside and outside the walls.
Kare
Feel so blessed to have you both here! Really appreciate your leadership and comfort over the difficult Covid years. Thank you – Karen Andersen and V Woolston
Kelly Moody
Steve and Kathy,
Congratulations on 10 years of ministry in this place! Thank you both for being faithful to your call in the many ways it has taken shape. Few of us will ever know the sacrifices you’ve made, or the heights and depths you have encountered along the way. But Saint Mark’s is surely richer for your presence and personally I am stronger in faith for having crossed paths with each of you.
May your next 10 years of ministry be vibrant and full of love.
Kelly
Christopher Kurth
To Dean Thomason,
My congratulations on your Saint Mark’s tenure comes from afar. I know of your ministry only thru online services that I have viewed here in Saint Louis, Missouri and from hearing your sermons, reading an article you published in the Cathedral newsletter, and in your recognition/receipt letter for the yearly donation I have given to Saint Mark’s since the pandemic started. Your ministry knows no limits, your reach knows no state boundaries. Cheers on your 10 year anniversary with St. Mark’s Cathedral!
God Bless You,
Christopher Kurth in Saint Louis, Missouri
Adam Oberstadt-Petrik
Dean Steve, thank you for being one of the influential clergy who helped me find my current place in the Church. I’m grateful for the three years during which I learned from your teaching and example. Laurel and I send love and best wishes from Christ Church Cambridge, and we hope to see you and all our friends at Saint Mark’s again in the future.
Carolyn Fix Blount
Dear Steve and Kathy,
Your arrival at Saint Mark’s coincided with my husband, Dick’s death, and the two of you have helped to fill that void in my heart. I have appreciated your wisdom, your teaching, your humility, and your friendship more than you know. Your kind and wise leadership has been wonderful in moving us all forward. Thank you so very much for this decade of leadership! May it continue
Jack Erskine and Christy Close Erskine
Steve, we remember fondly worshipping at St. Mark’s on the first Sunday of Advent, 2019 and your warm welcome that was much appreciated! Little did we know that less than a year later, Covid would once again bring us into the St. Mark’s community, but this time as virtual members. We are so grateful to worship with you each Sunday from Sisters, OR as the community you lead inspires us to exercise a growing ministry in regard to social justice. It also challenges us to continue to live into our baptismal covenant each and every day, while reminding us that we are always loved by God. So it is with grateful hearts that we congratulate you and Kathy on your 10th anniversary as Dean. We look forward to getting to know both of you better during times when we are actually in Seattle. Also know that should you and Kathy have occasion to “look to the mountains from whence comes your help,” we live amidst the mountains of Central Oregon and you are always welcome! Blessings and gratitude during this time of celebration!
Jack and Christy
Larry and Teresa Plutko
Steve and Kathy,
Congratulations on your 10th anniversary at St. Mark’s. We are fortunate to have you and wish you continued blessings and success.
Sarah McCord
Thank you, Steve and Kathy! We are all truly blessed to have you.
Elise von Koschembahr
Congratulations to you, our amazing Dean and Rector, and to Kathy, your wonderful wife and companion – we are SO blessed to have you both here with us at Saint Mark’s Cathedral.
You have faithfully served our every need, and shepherded us through a total redesign of our beautiful building; as well as navigating us safely through covid accommodations –
all with humor and grace and perseverance – one day at a time! God bless you both – and let’s hope for many more years to come!
Carol Ashcraft
I have enjoyed your live stream services very much as I am no longer able to go out to church. Congratulations on your 10th anniversary!
Beverley Brown Losey
Thank you for being there.
Knowing the wisdom of unanswered prayer, pray for many more years you are there at Saint Marks.
Ashley Bede
Steve and Kathy,
Words alone cannot express what you both mean to me and my kiddos! You have been a steady, forthright presence in the harder times and celebrated alongside us in the joyful ones. You have been warriors for justice and peace globally while improving our own parish at home (and becoming grandparents yourselves!). You are both gems in this crazy place we are living in these days, and we want you around Saint Mark’s for many more decades to come! Xoxo
Adam Conley
Thinking of you both as I navigate the literal and figurative trails of Sewanee. I’m grateful for your ministries and all I’ve learned from each of you.
Many blessings,
Adam Conley
James Ward
Steve and Kathy,
We are so grateful for your servant leadership at Saint Mark’s. We love you both. -Elizabeth and Jim Ward
Ginna Brelsford
Steve and Kathy, your ministry to the St. Mark’s c
continues to maintain a vibrancy, love and compassion for our blessed community as well as the wider world. Your abilities to nurture and motivate engagement is remarkable. Deep gratitude to you both.
Ginna Brelsford
Re Knack
Steve and Kathy –
Congratulations on ten years with the St. Mark’s community. We have learned so much from you both and have much gratitude for your leadership, friendship, service, hospitality and graciousness. Looking forward to continuing the journey with you.
Re Knack and Brian Cole
Steve Paul Moen
Untold story: When a team from the Search Committee visited St. Paul’s in Fayetteville, Arkansas, we were told by several parishioners that, if we were smart enough to hire Rev. Steve, we’d be getting a fantastic “two-fer” of Steve and Kathy Thomason. Well, we were smart enough to choose you two but, more importantly, we’re blessed beyond our hopes and dreams by your lives and ministries among us. Thanks be to God!