The Windsor Journal

For a church, the bottom line is not always the bottom line.

Despite facing the looming expenses needed for repairing the leaking roof of Grace Episcopal Church on Broad Street, and despite perennially empty coffers that forced painful sacrifices over the past year, the historic congregation took recently a look at the proceeds from its annual Holy Spirit auction, and decided to do what it always does this time of the year: help those in need.

Last Monday, during a small ceremony at the church's vestry, Vestry Warden Max Kuziak handed a $3,000 check to Windsor Community Service Council treasurer Lisa Boccia. The donation will mostly support the town's Food and Fuel Banks, while $500 dollars will aid the purchasing of diapers for toddlers of families in need.

The ceremony was also one of the first official acts of the new rector of the church, Rev. Harry “Chip” Elliot.

Father Chip replaced in November Rev. David Parachini who retired last May. Noted for his warm smile, the new Rector was for more than a decade head of St. Mary's Episcopal Church, in Manchester, until medical issues forced him to retire. Still, serving the church is not a profession but a calling, Father Chip says, and when his medical issues were resolved, he started once again looking for a parish he could serve – preferably on a less intensive schedule than before. With Grace Episcopal looking also for a part-time Rector to fit the constrains of its leaner budget, it was a match made in heaven.

Father Chip brings some unique experiences to Windsor. He left a very successful career to follow his calling, and received his Master of Divinity from from Bexley Hall Episcopal Seminary of Colgate Rochester Crozer Divinity School, the school Martin Luther King studied. He is married, and his wife Susan is special education teacher in South Windsor. They have three kids, and two great grandchildren.

Despite having served in a number of posts before he came to Windsor, father Chip didn't hesitate a second, when the Windsor Journal asked him this week how he felt in his new position.

“I think that Grace Church in Windsor is the best parish I've ever been in,” he responded. “I think the people of Windsor, the people of this parish are absolutely fantastic. They are so warm, and welcoming and the people of the town are so warm and welcoming, and I just feel a lot of positive things happening here in Windsor.”

Boccia was equally warm about the church's support of the town's less fortunate.

“When we saw the amount of the check, we couldn't believe it,” she said. “It is very much needed, and it's great that the members of Grace Episcopal are doing this.”

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