A New Face – and Ministry: The Rev. Christopher Worthley

It is such a pleasure to join the wonderful and welcoming community here at the Cathedral Church of St. Luke! Since first arriving here with my husband, Christian Clough, the Cathedral’s new Canon for Liturgy and Music, I have felt the amazing energy, character, and commitment of this holy place. With Dean Shambaugh’s encouragement, I am now excited and honored to roll up my own proverbial sleeves to serve alongside all of you.

Coming to Greater Portland has been more or less a homecoming for me, because I grew up just south of here in Kennebunk/Kennebunkport, where most of my family still reside. Some personal background: In 1990, I graduated from Tufts University with a B.A. in International Relations and German. After working for a number of years after college as a business journalist with the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung newspaper/publishing group in Frankfurt, Germany, I joined Allianz, a global insurance and financial services company, in 1996 to serve as a communications officer for international issues. Much of my work at the Allianz head office in Munich focused on efforts to restore to victims of the Holocaust and their families life insurance assets expropriated by the Nazi regime. After “repatriating” in 1999 and completing the three-year Master of Divinity degree at Yale University in 2002, I returned to Allianz to establish and direct the new Allianz Foundation for North America, focused on empowering young people to shape a secure future (www.allianz.com/foundation-na). Parallel to this continuing “ministry in the world”, I have pursued my ministry in the church as a priest by assisting in diverse parishes in California and Washington, DC – and now here at St. Luke’s. I very much look forward to getting to know you better, as I engage in this new ministry among you! Please feel free to reach out at any time: christopher.worthley@aya.yale.edu.