Pastor and Kathy, Continued.

  Interviewer: Pastor, you say you and Kathy are a team. How? 

  Pastor: When we were in Hawaii for a month (See photo at left.), I was studying to pass my                theological school test. I had to pass a test on every book in the Bible. Pretty much all I did for          that  month was study, with her quizzing me so I could take that test and pass it. 

  Kathy: We’re like a tag team. We’re in different rooms working on things, and he’ll call me to come    help with his project and I’ll call him to fix something. 

  Interviewer: Kathy, you had some surgery in 2023, and you said he was very much there for you.
Kathy: He takes really good care of me.

Pastor: I like to baby her, set a nice table for meals, even if it’s only soup.

Kathy: And our dog, our pitbull, Hank, he tells on me. If I’m supposed to be in bed and I get up, Hank runs downstairs to tattles on me. (See photo below of Hank with Pastor.) 

Pastor: And she takes care of me.
Kathy: I lower my high energy level when he needs rest. He’ll say, “I need this afternoon to be peaceful.”

Pastor: Emotional energy is like physical energy; you only have so much for the day.

I like to manage my energy in a healthy way, not deplete it, and take time to build it back up. There’s a daybed in our room, and sometimes I’ll go in and lie down and just read scripture. I need that, and she gives me that space. 

She’s the rabbit and I’m the turtle. I’m slow and methodical and want to make sure all the i’s are dotted and t’s crossed. I plan my whole week in advance. But sometimes I just need to slow down. 

She also takes care of our calendar, medical appointments and such. There are a lot of things like that, and if not for her, I’d probably miss things. 

Interviewer: What do you like to do in your spare time?
Kathy: Gardening. Antiques, I love going to museums. Trying to do renovations, thinking about the plans for interior or exterior design. 

Pastor: I love fooling with old motorcycles. I have a shop, Papa Stew Cycles in Ponderay. I like fixing stuff, taking things apart and putting them back together. At home, the coffee pot was acting up, so I took it apart and put it back together. 

Interviewer: Where did you grow up? What did you do before pastoring?

Pastor: I grew up near Mobile, Alabama and Pascagoula Mississippi. 

Interviewer: What do you miss about that area?

I miss the bayous, the fishing. laid back lifestyle, eating oysters and shrimp, the lazy days on the river. Going to mass at an old wooden catholic church. It was a historical area.  

I liked playing sports with kids. I was a baseball coach for 32 years in five states: Idaho, Alabama, Louisiana and Mississippi. I was pitching coach for a Sandpoint High School baseball team that won the state championship in 2005.  

Kathy: I have been a flight attendant with Delta for 45 years. I grew up in Petal, Mississippi. It’s a major Bible belt area.  We didn’t drink; there were whole counties that were dry.  

Pastor: We come from totally different cultures. We like to say of Kathy’s area…we would call them the “Bible Thumpers.” I grew up in coastal cities, which are much more mixed and wild. In the past, there were actually pirates coming in and out of ports, attacking and stealing the contents of other ships.

Kathy: We had such freedom as children; it was so safe. We would just go out in the morning and play all day go in the woods, run around to friends’ houses, and come home at dark. We were outside almost all the time.  

Through high school, I (Kathy) played basketball. I played year round from the sixth grade. I didn’t think it was a big deal, but someone sent me a newspaper clip that showed me as one of the top four players on my high school team. I ran track all during high school. I played in the band. I was a cheerleader. I went to college: three years at Southern Mississippi University and then one final year in New Hampshire for my degree in psychology. 

Pastor: I spent a lot of my free time playing baseball. 

Interviewer: Pastor you’ve had a lot of tragedy in your life with the death of your wife and two sons. Did that have anything to do with becoming a pastor? 

Yes. I was a mess. I ended up on doorstep of a church trying to deal with death of my son. A number of times I had been steered toward becoming a pastor. Then, at this time, I heard a clear voice, saying: “Son, are you ready to do what I told you now?” I said yes. And here I am, the pastor of this terrific new church, The Living Word Idaho, based here in Sandpoint, Idaho, reaching congregants as far as Coeur d’ Alene and Elmira, Idaho.

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