Welcome, Rev. Oberholtzer!
The Congregation of the Unitarian Universalist Church of the Susquehanna Valley (UUCSV) in Northumberland, Pennsylvania voted on May 16th, 2021 to make the Rev. Edward Keido Sanshin Oberholtzer a UUCSV Community Affiliate Minister, and celebrates his move into this new role.
The Rev. Oberholtzer is an ordained Soto Zen priest. Rev. Oberholtzer was ordained by the Rev. James Myoun Ford, a Soto Zen priest as well as a Unitarian Universalist minister and will be receiving Dharma transmission from him in June. He leads the Joseph Priestley Zen Sangha, an affiliate of Empty Moon Zen in Long Beach, California. The sangha is named for Dr. Joseph Priestley (1733-1804), who helped found Unitarianism in England and later was instrumental in bringing this denomination to the United States. Dr. Priestley is buried in Northumberland, near the home where he lived for the last decade of his life.
Rev. Oberholtzer has previously served the UUCSV as a member of their Board of Directors, the chair of the Worship Committee, and as leader of the Joseph Priestley Zen Sangha which (until the pandemic) was housed in the UUCSV church building, just down the street from where Joseph Priestley spent his last ten years at the turn of the 18th century.
It seems only appropriate that the Rev. Oberholtzer bring his Zen practice, so firmly grounded in the breath, to a congregation that looks back to its heritage with Dr. Priestley, the discoverer of oxygen.
