A lot of people at St. Paul’s know Pat Bostain. But some don’t. Here’s the short of what you need to know: Pat is eternally young. A true optimist. To her, there is always more, better, higher. I’ve seen Pat sit down, but I’ve never seen her slow down. She’s in constant motion, the gears are always turning. And if she’s asks a lot from you, don’t worry, she’ll give you everything she has to help you. Is it any wonder that she helped build St. Paul’s?
For the next three weeks, we’re going to be looking at what it means to have a building. St. Paul’s originally met in Father Michael Gilton’s house, then moved to Folsom Elementary’s cafeteria. 7 years later, October 2014, ground broke on this site. Pat was Sr. Warden then and worked hand in hand with Father Michael.
I asked what that was like.
“I cannot imagine the number of meetings I went to. But they never seemed a burden. It was all a blessing to me. I felt I was guided in my decisions. I felt the Lord with me. All the work was a blessing.”
How closely did you work with the architect to design the space?
“We sat down and explained our vision. Then, later, when the drawings were rolled out in front of us, we were all absolutely floored by what we saw: it was exactly what we were envisioning. It was like a dream got put on paper.”
Church spaces are different and space does something to a church. Ours is unique with the open Connect Space. What does the Connect Space do to our congregation?
“The Connect Space was the most important thing to me. It was almost made smaller, due to budget cuts. But I fought and fought to keep the design. I’m so glad I did! The space makes us the kind of community I know we’re becoming. A place were people talk and eat, with coffee hours and huge meals and families and kids. The Connect Space is so important to who we are.”
What else would you want people to know about building this church?
“I would like people to know that being apart of building St. Paul’s is one of the greatest accomplishments in my life.”
Amen.
Tom+