Local Pastor to Retire

In 1998, the population of was exploding.

But attendance at , in contrast, was dwindling.

“When I came [to the church], Will County was in the midst of huge growth,” Pastor Nancy Zoelzer Pfaltzgraf said. On average, about 30 people attended Sunday worship services, down from 100 just a few years before.

“[The church] said, ‘We’re not growing, and we want to know why,’” said Pfaltzgraf. It was part of her job to help figure out why — and how to reverse the trend.

Now, 14 year later, Pfaltzgraf is retiring, leaving behind a very different church.

On June 10, Pfaltgraf will preside over her final worship service, 10 years after becoming lead pastor at Plainfield Congregational UCC.

Nearing her 65th birthday, Pfaltzgraf said she felt the time was right to begin a new chapter.

“I thought, ‘OK, it’s probably time,’” she said. “It’s also time for a different kind of leadership.”

After guiding the church through a complete redevelopment, “I think I’ve taken them as far as I can take them,” she said, adding with a laugh, “Although they would disagree.”

Pfaltzgraf said she plans to travel with her husband, Reverend Dr. Tom Zoelzer, and spend time with the youngest member of her family: a brand-new grandson. 

After arriving in 1998, Pfaltzgraf led a churchwide redevelopment, helping to grow the parish and increase its involvement in the community.

“We moved to what I would say is not a straight-out contemporary [service] but a more spirit-rich worship style,” she said. “Probably a way to say it is a more sensory-rich, spirit-deep worship.”

That included adding music, dance and occasional skits — such as sermons delivered in the first person as a character from the Bible — to worship services.

But the changes went even deeper than changing the worship style.

“I believe the church is not here just for the people who are in the church,” Pfaltzgraf said. “So what do we do to make the world a better place?”

For the congregation at Plainfield Congregational UCC, the answer was “a lot.”

The Plainfield church has become involved in global efforts to feed the hungry, from partnering with a rural church on projects through the Foods Resource Bank to working with the and other area food banks.

 “In the nine years that we have been part of [Foods Resource Bank], we have been part of raising over $600,000 to go to food security programs around the world,” Pfaltzgraf said.

Members of the church also serve meals each month at MorningStar Mission in Joliet. Meanwhile, UCC’s confirmation students have worked with Hesed House, a homeless shelter in Aurora.

While she’ll be retired, Pfaltzgraf doesn’t plan to be idle.

She said she hopes to offer guidance to churches undergoing their own redevelopments, and plans to continue her work at Grace United Methodist Church of Christ in Joliet, where she is a certified InterPlay leader.

“InterPlay is learning how to create more joy, more ease, how to live with less stress,” she said of the practice, which uses movement, voice and storytelling to create connections.

Plainfield Congregational UCC is beginning a nationwide search for a new pastor. Ultimately, it will be the members of the congregation who make the decision.

“There were a lot of tears when I announced this in February,” Pfaltzgraf said. “But we’ve been working through a lot of closure.”

Pfaltzgraf said saying goodbye has been bittersweet.

“There’s some excitement and some anxiety” in what the pastor said she views as a new start.

“It’s an emotionally difficult time because I’ve formed very deep relationships with the people in the congregation,” she said. “It’s hard for me to walk away, and it’s hard for them to let go.”

Pfaltzgraf said the community is invited to a farewell luncheon immediately following her final worship service on June 10.

“There’s a big party planned,” she said. “It’ll be fun.”