Pastor Patty arrived in town to closed doors. It was just after the Covid pandemic started and her new church, Patagonia Community United Methodist, was, like most businesses in town, locked down. Patty had no idea who her congregation members were, and never got to meet them for over a year, except by talking over the air to imagined listeners on the weekly radio broadcast she created.
Flash forward three and a half years, and she now finds herself leaving for Florida filled with a heart full of love for Patagonia. It was Patty’s decision to leave at the end of this month after her 35-year-old son died unexpectedly last March in Maryland. She and her husband—and PCUMC assistant pastor—Andy Frick, simply decided they needed to return to the East coast to be closer to family.
But, “I keep thinking of how much I love the people here,” she says. “I have walked with some through some really hard things, but they’ve walked me through hard things; they’ll always live in my heart. It will be a terrible loss knowing that people were caring, supporting me. . . encouraging me, listening to me [here].”
Back in 2020, Patty had recently retired from Maryland to Arizona, and was enticed out of retirement when she learned on a visit to our Community Church Thrift Shop that there was a half-time pastor position here. She got the appointment and she and Andy split their week between Patagonia and their new home in Green Valley until moving here full-time six months ago. Since then she has “walked every inch of town,” usually with their dog Milo, “a brown hound which likes to say hello by jumping up and down on you—he’s headed to obedience school.”
“It’s so interesting how this town has so much diversity,” she comments. “There’s a live-and-let-live mentality where a millionaire doesn’t mind living next to a humble place. It seems like people just enjoy being neighbors. People will get along with each other even though they don’t agree with each other; they are respectful of their differences, whether political or how they live.”
She adds, “What I really connect with in this community is that people have come from a lot of other places and there’s a lot of tolerance and a sense of really caring about each other. There’s a sense of belonging to something that is going to encourage and nurture you. I haven’t experienced that in other place.”
It is fitting that one of her favorite memories is last month’s Christmas Eve service which ended with people holding candles outside in a circle in the church courtyard lit by luminarias. “There was a big moon and a big star—and a loving circle of goodwill. Wonderful!”
The community is invited to drop by and say goodbye to Pastor Patty: Sunday, Jan. 28, at 11:30am at Thurber Hall – Patagonia Community UMC, 387 McKeown Ave, Patagonia. There will also be a potluck, so if you’d like to stay to eat, please bring a dish to share. (Pastor Andy has already left with one of their dogs to set up their new house in Florida.)