Christ Church Cathedral, Hartford submitted a proposal in May, 2008 to the Lilly Endowment, Inc. Clergy Renewal Program for a grant for an extended leave for the Very Reverend Mark B. Pendleton, Dean, to allow him to take three months away from the daily routine of ministry. The time away will invite spiritual, personal, professional, and physical renewal by allowing Mark three months to rest, read, study, travel and to be more fully present with his wife Leslie and two teenage children, William and Lydia. Mark hopes to learn to cook and explore the importance of food and preserving cherished family recipes – especially in their relationship to community and congregational hospitality and healing. He will spend time at a cooking school in California, learn first hand about the role that food and recipes played in post-Katrina New Orleans, visit a monastery that is known for its bread baking ministry, and while at home, he will study and read the poetry of Wallace Stevens, so that he can be a better informed host to the many visitors who arrive -- often unannounced -- at the Cathedral’s rectory, the one-time home of the fabled Hartford poet.

After the completion of the three month sabbatical, Mark will return to his ministry at the Cathedral refreshed and renewed and with a greater understanding of the place of hospitality within Christian ministry and a stronger vision about how the Cathedral can extend its mission throughout the city of Hartford and the Episcopal Diocese of Connecticut.