Staff

Douglas Stewart

Pastor

Pastor Doug grew up on a 12-acre farm in East Montpelier, Vermont. After graduating from Roanoke College in Salem, Va., with his BA in Political Science, Doug received his Master of Divinity from Gettysburg Lutheran Seminary and was ordained in June 1994.
In the nearly 30 years that Doug has been serving the church, he has come to discover a passion for issues of social justice and advocacy. Perhaps time spent working on Capitol Hill back in his college years planted seeds for what has become a calling to be a voice for those who have none. Perhaps serving a congregation like Incarnate Word, which is committed to being a relevant presence in the city of Rochester, has helped kindle this passion of reaching out to the least and the last. More than likely however, Doug’s unquenchable thirst for reaching out to those living on the margins comes from Jesus himself when he told his followers a long time ago, “Love God. Love neighbor. Nothing else matters”.

Thatcher Lyman

Director of Music

Thatcher Lyman holds degrees from Oberlin College and Conservatory in Oberlin, OH (BM, Organ; BA, Mathematics), the University of York, England (MA, Ensemble Singing), and the Eastman School of Music in Rochester, NY (MM, Organ), where he is pursuing a DMA degree in Organ Performance with David Higgs. His past organ teachers include Hans Davidsson, James David Christie, and Haskell Thomson, and he has had vocal coaching with Ben Davidson, Anna Maria Friman, John Potter, and Stephen Kennedy. Thatcher was an Alto Choral Scholar at York Minster, and is a member of the vocal quintet Uncloistered. In 2009, Thatcher received Eastman’s Gerald Barnes Award for Excellence in Pipe Organ. He was a finalist for the 2010 John R. Rodland Memorial Scholarship and received third prize in the 2012 AGO NYACOP. He is Director of Music at The Lutheran Church of the Incarnate Word and Assistant Director of the Schola Cantorum of Christ Church, both in downtown Rochester, NY. When not doing musical things, he can be found canoeing on a lake with his wife Isobel, playing with and taking apart trains with his son Joseph, or working on various vehicular and household projects.