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Clough called as Area Minister for Metropolitan Boston
June, 2001
Thomas Clough – who was baptized in Cambridge, ordained in Lynnfield and served churches in Lexington and Arlington – has been called as the Metropolitan Boston Area Minister.
Clough will take the place of Interim Area Minister Malcolm Bertram as of Sept. 1st. Before that, Charles Harper served in the post for 23 years.
“Tom Clough is a native of the MBA and he has a long, proven track record of pastorates in the Association,” said Interim Conference Minister and President Erwin Bode. “He has a strong pastoral presence and a deep commitment to mission.”
Clough and his wife, Ava Clough, are just finishing a two-year stint as missionaries in Honduras. His work on housing and her work on public health was sponsored by eight MBA churches.
“We were very impressed with the way he coordinated eight MBA churches for the missionary work he has been doing,” said Larry Bowers, chair of the MBA search committee. “He was chosen primarily because we thought he would be a good person for uniting the MBA.”
Normally, missionaries are sponsored by the UCC as a whole, not by specific congregations. But in what was something of a test case for the UCC, the Cloughs approached the churches asking for their sponsorship, which allowed the churches to be directly involved in their work and to get regular updates.
“This experience has opened my eyes to the possibility of MBA congregations working together with congregations in other parts of the world,” Clough said. “I hope that direct involvement of congregations in international exchanges at the association and conference levels will help us to be more aware of the potential for service that can come from working together at these levels.”
Bowers said Clough was also chosen because his career “reflects a dedication to teaching – and there is a need for MBA churches to be taught more about the UCC.”
Clough served for nine years as the Minister of Education at the Hancock United Church of Christ in Lexington. He spent a sabbatical leave as a secondary school teacher in Kenya and before being ordained he taught in rural Nigeria and elsewhere.
Both Bowers and Clough agreed that the area minister’s primary role will be to serve as a pastor to the clergy of the MBA.
“I bring to this position an awareness of the challenges which face pastors and congregations in the Metro Boston area, having faced many of them myself or having shared the experiences of my colleagues over the years,” he said.
Clough was one of 13 candidates, including nine men, four women and three people who self-identified as gay or people of color. The position was advertised nationally, and a dozen letters were sent to UCC leaders asking for candidate recommendations.
“I was deeply impressed by the quality of the applicants,” said Bowers, a member of Old South Church in Boston. “It is a testimony to the strength and future of this Church that the people who applied for this opening were outstanding.”