The church staff of St. Columba’s Church meets fortnightly to pray for the church and to discern God’s will for the congregation. St. Columba’s Church currently has a Senior Minister, a Youth Ministry Leader, a Children’s Ministry Leader, an Assistant Minister and a Church Administrator on the staff. If you would like to contact the church staff, please click here.
Louis Kinsey
Louis has been the minister of St. Columba’s since February 1990, having been an assistant minister for a year and a half in Elgin, Morayshire. He became a Christian as a child in the Salvation Army, and feels a great debt to that branch of the Church.
Since 1990 St. Columba’s Church has changed hugely as it tries to relate to a changing world. It has grown into a vibrant and loving congregation, sharing the love of Jesus Christ with large numbers of people in the local community through a wide range of effective ministries and Christian activities directed at all age groups. Louis leads the Church Staff Team.
His work at St. Columba’s Church is focused on relevant Bible teaching, inspiring worship, and compassionate Christian outreach. In addition to being minister of St. Columba’s Church, Louis is a chaplain in the Territorial Army, chaplain to four local schools, and also a prison chaplain in HMP Aberdeen, working in a team of chaplains and evangelists.
Born in the north of England, and having grown up in Zimbabwe, Louis served in the British Army before studying Divinity at the University of Edinburgh. He is married to Sally, a primary school teacher, and they have two sons. Louis is a wannabe hymn-writer, occasional jogger, and sometime trumpet-player who can often be found in Starbucks on Monday mornings, trying to get away from it all. Saturday mornings are spent watching his sons play rugby, and dreaming of the past.
Louis's Blog is at http://coffeewithlouis.wordpress.com.
Marion Paterson
Church Administrator
Marion has been a member of the congregation at St Columba’s since 1991. During her time at St C’s, she has been Secretary to the Under 5’s, Sunday School Teacher and more recently been a member of the Powerpoint Team. As a child, she was brought up in Gamrie, Banff before moving to Aberdeen. She attended Sunday School and Girls Brigade at North Church of St Andrews and Northfield Parish Church, where she became a Christian and thereafter a Church member.
Marion works full time as a Human Resources Administrator with an oil and gas operator. She is married to John and they have two daughters. To unwind after a stressful day, Marion pursues her hobby of swimming.
Neil Montgomery
Session Clerk
Neil has worshipped at St Columba's since 1991 and is married with three grown up children.
He became a Christian when in his teens and living in Hong Kong!
Neil helped lead the Alpha Course, a course for those wanting to find out more about the Christian faith, for a number of years at St Columba's and currently helps co-ordinate the church prayer meeting, as well as leading church services from time to time.
He has worked in the public service for almost all of his working life and enjoys walking, cycling and
eating out!
Sue Thomson
Sue is the Children’s Ministry Leader at St. Columba’s. Her job is to help manage and develop all our children’s activities inside and outside the church. Her vision is to provide many “ways in” for every child in our community; many opportunities for them to learn about Christ and to grow in their knowledge of God and the Bible.
With the help of a wonderful team of volunteers Sue aims to teach every child how to come into the presence of God and to experience Him as Father, longing for each child to love God and serve Him.
Growing up in a Christian family Sue first came to St. Columba’s over 10 years ago when she moved to Aberdeen to study at University. Graduating in medicine she worked for 5 years at the Royal Aberdeen Children’s Hospital and in her spare time helped out in our children’s groups.
Sensing God’s call to give all her working time to Christian children’s work, Sue took the opportunity when her husband John had a year’s placement in Australia to make the career change. Working for Scripture Union North Queensland as their Primary Schools Worker was fantastic experience for her role here at St. Columba’s. Sue works part time, Tuesdays from 12 and Thursdays. Most of Sue’s spare time is taken up looking after her two small children but when she gets the odd spare moment she loves scrapbooking.
Tom Webster
Tom Webster has been the youth ministry leader at St. Columba's since January 2005. With a fantastic team of volunteers he divides his time between discipling our church young people and creating opportunities for outreach to the local community. One of his major role is as a chaplain to Bridge of Don Academy and its feeder primary schools.
He was born in Durham but spent his childhood in Toronto, Canada and after moving back to the UK spent his teenage years in Oxford. Through active family involvement in churches in Canada and England as well as many happy summers attending holiday camps he grew up knowing Christ.
Tom graduated with an MA in Divinity from Aberdeen University in 2005. He loves playing the drums and fancies himself as a bit of a chef. He has recently started running and rediscovered his childhood love for comic books. He is married to Kim, a doctor.
You can email Tom tom@stcolumbaschurch.org.uk
Check out the youth pages Click here
The Youth Team blogs here http://stcyouthblog.blogspot.com/
Dan was born in Greenock, and raised in Glasgow and Inverness. Although belonging to a loving Christian family, for a number of reasons he felt God was miserable, not to be trusted, followed or that impressive. Dan studied business economics at Paisley University for 4 years, worked as a barman in New Zealand for a year, travelled in Australia and then worked in Spain for 2 ½ years. In all this time Dan thought he was the most impressive thing the world had to offer.
He found out that he was wrong both about himself and about God. At the most humiliated and hurting point in his life, Jesus showed up. He was blown away and his world was turned upside in the most wonderful way. After years of telling God, “Get lost!” amazingly he found himself loved, forgiven and his friend. From that moment he has had a burning passion to tell and show people that God is great, good, alive and his name is Jesus. He says, “Knowing Jesus changes everything!”
Dan spent some time training with Youth With a Mission. He went to Turkey for a few months experiencing God in the same way as the early church in the Book of Acts had. He was employed as Parish Evangelist at the Barn Church of Scotland in Inverness before starting his theological studies at the University of Aberdeen. He specialised in New Testament studies. During his studies he fell in love with and married Stef who he describes as, “a holy honey.” Dan has been a Street Pastor, an Alpha Advisor and has some experience with prison and student ministry. Dan and Stef moved from Inverness to Aberdeen at the end of summer 2008 to join St. Columba’s Church. They are very excited to see what God is doing.
Dan thinks he is funny. He also thinks he is good a football. He really likes food. He is proud to be ginger.
