St. Matthew's UCC in Kunkletown, welcomed the Rev. Suzanne Brooks-Cope to the pulpit, Sunday, Jan. 22 as it's new Stated Supply pastor.

She introduced herself and offered a brief biography during the morning's worship service.She was born in Baltimore, Maryland, one of five children. She graduated from Hollins College in Roanoke, Virginia.A biology major studying pre-med, she was very active in chapel and religious activities on campus.It was during her senior year she began struggling with her "sense of call to the ministry."After graduation, she decided to do a year of full-time volunteer work and joined the Jesuit Volunteer Corp where she was placed in an inner city health clinic while living in a Christian community.After her year, she realized God was calling her to seminary and not medical school but continued working with JVC for two more years in an outreach center for the homeless."That was a changing point in my life. I grew up in a middle class white suburban home and then had the opportunity to see Christ in the poor of Baltimore. My eyes were opened in a way that they never had been," she says.It was while attending Princeton Theological Seminary that she met her future husband, Scott Brooks Cope, also a student.They both worked at Trenton Psychiatric Hospital as student chaplains. They married while attending their second year.After they graduated, Scott accepted a call as pastor of Lower Saucon UCC and she, the associate pastor of Zion UCC in Lehighton.Their oldest child, Patricia, was born during their second year in seminary. Their son Trevor was born while she was associate pastor of Zion.Her husband accepted a call to begin a new UCC church in Jacksonville, Florida and they moved there in 1992.She served two churches in Florida-as assistant pastor at Orange Park Presbyterian (six plus years) and pastor of St. Andrews Presbyterian Church, (almost 13 years.)"It was at Orange Park that God proved to have a wonderful sense of humor, when I was 39 and discovered we were expecting another child, which turned out to be twins, Timothy and Taylor, now 14 years old."Her husband, Scott, recently accepted the position of director of pastoral care at Phoebe Ministries in Allentown.She and their twin sons recently moved back to the area and she has agreed to be St. Matthew's UCC's Stated Supply pastor for the next three months."I'm looking forward to my time with everyone here at St. Matthew's," she says.