The Rev. Dr. Andrew Weisner
May 12, 2024 - Present
Pastor Andrew Weisner is a native of North Carolina and grew up near Winston-Salem in the town of Rural Hall. He attended Lenoir-Rhyne College in Hickory, NC and graduated with a Bachelor of Arts in philosophy in 1979. He became a Lutheran while attending Lenoir-Rhyne and, during his senior year, he decided to go to seminary.
Pastor Weisner’s formation in seminary, at the Lutheran Theological Seminary at Gettysburg (LTS), was under the tutelage of Professors Eric W. Gritsch and Robert W. Jenson in church history and theology. He spent one year of seminary in Washington, DC and another year in New York City. In New York City, he studied parish ministry and served as a chaplain in a local hospital. He earned his Master of Divinity degree and became a pastor in Greensboro, NC (1983). He was ordained by Bishop Michael C.D. McDaniel in the NC Lutheran Synod, LCA, and served his first church in Greensboro for over five years. During his fourth year, he met his future wife, Claudia, and her daughter Amanda. Fifteen months after they were married, they moved to Chicago for six years where Pastor Weisner pursued his Ph.D. in Church History, receiving it in 2006.
From Chicago, Pastor Weisner returned to NC to Lenoir-Rhyne College to serve as the campus pastor from 1995 – 2020. During those years Lenoir-Rhyne became a university, grew to become three campuses, and Pastor Weisner was named "Dean of University Ministries."
Upon leaving Lenoir-Rhyne, he became a member of the North American Lutheran Church (NALC). After serving as a long-term interim pastor at Antioch Lutheran Church in Dallas, NC, Pastor Weisner came to New Covenant Lutheran Church on May 12, 2024. In addition to his ministry at New Covenant he is director of the NALC Carolinas Mission Region’s McDaniel-Yoder Center for Theology, a continuing education center for clergy and laity; and an adjunct professor for the North American Lutheran Seminary (NALS) in Ambridge, PA.
Pastor Weisner and Claudia have four other children who lived with them during their growing-up years in addition to Amanda: Amber, who is now married and has four boys of her own; Autumn, who lives in Charlotte; Alexus (a "Gold Award Girl Scout") who is married and has a 3 year-old boy; and Antonio, now age 20.
Pastor Weisner enjoys music and church history, and his wife says "his hobbies are church, church, and church."
The Rev. Marty Ramey
Served June 2022 - October 2023
I was born 3rd of 7 children to Harlan Ivan and Mary Ballard Burnett in the small Rio Grande Valley town of Raymondville, Texas. My father worked in construction, mother was a registered nurse. She served as County Health Nurse for our small county for over 15 years. Her dedication to serving the migrant community was formative for my faith. We attended the Presbyterian Church every Sunday during my childhood, come rain or shine.
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Following high school, I attended Rice University for 2 years, then moved to California to live with an aunt and uncle. I worked at the Naval Construction Battalion Center in Port Hueneme, California, where I met my first husband, an officer in the Civil Engineer Corps; we were married in 1975. We were stationed at the Naval Air Station, Sigonella, Sicily, for two years, then moved to West Lafayette, Indiana, where I completed my Bachelor of Science degree in Microbiology. I worked in research labs in Winston-Salem and Research Triangle Park near Raleigh for 10 years. When my first husband and I separated and divorced in 1991, I felt the call to ordained ministry and moved with our two children, Mike, age 6, and Brenda, age 3, to Columbia, South Carolina. I received my Master of Divinity degree from Lutheran Theological Southern Seminary in 1995.
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I was ordained in 1998 and served my first call at Salem Lutheran Church in Lincolnton, NC. In 2000, I began a one-year resident chaplaincy program in Clinical Pastoral Education at Carolinas Healthcare System. Upon completion, I served as chaplain at the Lutheran nursing homes in Hickory and later at Hospice of Lincoln County.
Returning to congregational ministry, I served as full-time pastor in two congregations in the Gaston County area. In 1996, I had remarried. My husband Marion (who was my son’s Little League coach—but that is a story in itself!), had a daughter, Tricia, from a previous marriage. We now have 4 grandchildren, ranging in age from 6 to 24. The 24 years of my marriage to Marion were the greatest blessing I have experienced in my life; he and I were inseparable. We traveled throughout the United States and I have wonderful memories of the places we visited.
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Marion was diabetic. He began dialysis in 2014, and his health declined significantly over the next few years. It was important for me to become his full-time caregiver, but I could not afford to be without at least some compensation to help with high medical expenses. Earlier, I had completed training at the Centers for Congregational Health, Winston-Salem, North Carolina, and received Intentional Interim Training and Certification in 2001. In 2016, I began serving as an intentional interim minister and have subsequently served in nine congregations in transition between pastors to assist them in the call process.
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In 2019, Marion’s health issues became critical, and I resigned from the interim position I was serving at the time to stay home and take care of him full-time. Marion passed away in December 2019 from septic shock, a result of complications of diabetes. I felt as if a part of me died with him and withdrew from many activities. But I know that God did not give me the skills and the experience for interim ministry for nothing, and my decision to answer God’s call back into serving him in the best way I can is founded in my belief that God’s plans are always for the best. “…we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose.” (Romans 8:28)
The Rev. M. Henry Pawluk
Served 2020 - May 2022
In 2020, New Covenant called its first Pastor and Mission Developer, Pastor M. Henry Pawluk.
Pastor Pawluk was born and raised in Connecticut where his parents settled in 1952 shortly after emigrating from Germany. His German mother and Ukrainian father spoke only German at home, so Pastor Pawluk (he does prefer to be called Pr. Pawluk) speaks fluent German. As one of six children, he understands the challenges and joys of family life.
After high school Pr. Pawluk attended Wagner College (a Lutheran affiliated school) in Staten Island, New York where he majored in chemistry. However, the Lord had other plans, and he enrolled at the former Lutheran Seminary at Philadelphia, now known as United Lutheran Seminary where he received a Master of Divinity degree. During his seminary years Pastor Pawluk did intern and supply parish work in urban areas of Philadelphia while his wife, Karen, worked as a classroom teacher.
Upon graduation in 1978, he was called as mission pastor to Resurrection Lutheran Church in Boston, MA. This was followed by successful pastorates in three other mid-sized New England cities: Waterbury, CT; Manchester, NH and New Haven, CT. After a first “early retirement” from ministry in 2009, Pr. Pawluk spent a few years living and working in a rural town in Vermont in a home which he nearly entirely built himself. During this time period he also completed a Master of Sacred Theology degree at the Philadelphia Lutheran Seminary specializing in the Theology of The Trinity.
In 2014 he was called back into the ministry and joined the North American Lutheran Church. He became pastor of a newly formed mission congregation in Irmo, South Carolina. After five years, New Hope Lutheran grew, prospered, and completed a lovely new building. Pastor Pawluk “re-retired,” and he and his wife, Karen, then decided to move a little closer to the mountains and relocated to Hickory.
He recently began serving as Mission Developer for New Covenant Lutheran Mission, (NALC), a devoted and enthusiastic group currently worshiping in the Sossoman Chapel at Sossoman’s Funeral Home in Morganton. Pr. Pawluk is delighted to be serving the Lord in this wonderful area of North Carolina, which he and his wife, Karen, are now calling home. He and Karen have two adult children. Their son, Justin, his wife and two children live in Roswell, GA, and their daughter, Joanna, lives and works in Burlington, Vermont.