A New Chapter for Montville Lutheran Church

Signaling the start of a new chapter in the continuing life story of the Evangelical Lutheran Church of the Holy Spirit, 70 River Road, Montville, the Rev. Michael Patrick Dunne will be installed as its new pastor on Sunday, May 31 in a special service at 4:00 pm.

“I am looking forward to serving in the Montville area with the members of Holy Spirit as we reach out to the needs of the community. We invite our neighbors to come join in the good to great things that are happening in this new chapter of Holy Spirit’s life,” said Dunne, who is currently serving at St. Thomas Lutheran Church in Manalapan.

After several years of interim and vacancy pastoral leadership, the congregation at Holy Spirit is pleased to be continuing its mission of celebrating and proclaiming the love of Jesus Christ to the community under the guidance and leadership of Pastor Dunne.

Pastor Dunne was born in Jersey City, NJ in 1957 and graduated from the Concordia Theological Seminary, Fort Wayne, IN. in 2008. Prior to his seminary studies, he was a district representative for the Aid Association for Lutherans (now Thrivent Financial for Lutherans) and a sales associate at Sears. He served as a vicar at Zion Lutheran Church in Clark, NJ before receiving the call to St. Thomas.

He is a member of the Lutheran Church Missouri Synod’s national Lutheran Emergency Response Team, the NJ District Lutheran Disaster Response Team, the Outreach Committee, the Pastors’ Conference Planning Committee and the Transforming Churches Network. While serving St. Thomas in Manalapan, Pastor Dunne was a certified member of the Manalapan Community Emergency Response Team, chaplain to the Gordon’s Corner Fire Company, and adult advisor to the Manalapan Teen Leadership Committee.

He and his wife, the former Deborah Rindfleisch, will reside in the parsonage on Pine Brook Road, Towaco. They have a son, Patrick, and daughter-in-law, Jennifer who currently reside in Panama.

About the Lutheran Church of the Holy Spirit
The Evangelical Lutheran Church of the Holy Spirit began as a mission congregation in Montville in 1962. Services were originally led by the Reverend Kenneth Schwengel in the gymnasium of Central School. With the growth of the congregation, land was purchased on River Road to build a church. The building, which features a 29-foot wooden cross as an interior focal point behind the altar and an integral part of the church structure, was completed just after Thanksgiving in 1970 and dedicated shortly thereafter. Worship services are held Sundays at 10:30 am with Holy Communion celebrated on the first and third Sundays of the month.

Pastor Dunne will be the fifth ordained clergy to be installed at Holy Spirit. Members of the community are cordially invited to attend the service and reception to celebrate and welcome Pastor and Mrs. Dunne. For more information, please call 973-263-1696.