by Susan Sherrill Axelrod
It’s not unusual for the career paths followed by Episcopal clergy to have taken a number of turns—sometimes sharp ones—before ending up at the church. For the Rev. George Cooper, who will retire after two years as the diocese’s interim CFO on Dec. 31, the path to fulfilling his call as a deacon also took a short but meaningful detour.
Cooper started his working life in finance. After getting his MBA at the University of New Hampshire, the Exeter, NH native got a job in a manufacturing plant, where he worked for five years before being laid off when the plant closed. “At the time, my wife was home with two very young children, and I was not worried, I don’t know why,” Cooper says.
He was right not to worry. Five weeks later he was hired as the accounting manager for Southern Maine Medical Center in Biddeford, launching him into the world of nonprofits, primarily social service agencies, which except for a short stint at a for-profit hospital, spanned 20 years. The last of these nonprofits was the Portland Public Library, where Cooper worked as finance director. “I got to know a lot of the downtown folks and got a window into seeing what that was like and what the hardships were for those people. It helped me realize that was where I wanted to go.” He was also active at the Cathedral Church of St. Luke in Portland, serving in youth formation and on the vestry, including two terms as senior warden.
“During the latter part of that senior warden period, I guess you could say I was feeling the call,” Cooper says. “It was not something I had planned out, but just the longer it went on, the deeper it got and the better it got.” He thought he would sync this turn on the path with his retirement, “so that I could get out from behind the desk and start working in the world face-to-face, not through people like I had been for most of my career,” he says. Cooper retired at the end of 2020 and was ordained in June of 2022. That September, he was invited to breakfast by Bishop Brown, who wanted to get to know him. “I talked about my career, and he said, ‘perhaps you could help me.’”
The newly minted deacon had landed in Brown’s orbit at an opportune time. The diocese’s two longtime finance professionals, Terry Reimer and Tom Sumner, were due to retire, and the bishop wanted help to bridge the gap. Cooper quickly developed a reputation as a calm steward of necessary change.
“The finance department had been operating with a system that was antiquated,” says the Rev. Lael Sorensen, retiring Diocesan Council finance chair and rector of St. Peter’s, Rockland. “It relied on Terry’s individual memory and work that was not easily replicated. George felt committed to making it so that the finances of the Episcopal Diocese of Maine were not person-dependent.”
Sorensen tells two stories that she says illustrate Cooper’s particular gifts. “When we met with George as a finance group, he said, quarter after quarter, ‘This is large and systemic, and I’m glad I’m here, but there’s not a quick fix.’ To be able to say that to a group of people and hold your ground requires tremendous spiritual fortitude. We had to hold in our minds his assurance that it’s a big job, it’s hard, and it’s going to take time.”
While the finance committee practiced patience, Cooper, Sorensen, and another member of the group were called to visit a parish that was struggling. “We met in the cold undercroft, and George was not only prepared, he had brought his laptop,” Sorensen says. “In the course of our conversation he said to the treasurer and the senior warden, ‘What if we did this?’ and he presented a fix that I thought was reasonable and real and right on target. And they said, ‘I think we can do that.’ He was on point and present for both groups in different ways.”
The gap Cooper was charged with bridging “in many ways has now been bridged,” he says. “As a result, I haven’t done everything I wanted to do or want to do as a deacon, and my wife retired in April and she’s ready for me to be available for adventure.” In addition, Cooper plans to stay busy with golf, yoga, sailing in the dory-style boat he built, and spending time with his adult children, who both live in Maine, as well as what he quips is his “high-maintenance dog,” a Frenchton named Leo. Having served as deacon at St. Alban’s in Cape Elizabeth for three years, he’s eager to continue in that ministry, to the delight of St. Alban’s rector, the Rev. Joshua Hill.
“When you open a dictionary and look up the word ‘calm’ there is a picture of George Cooper,” Hill says. “I could’ve picked other words like steady, or patient, or kind, or compassionate, or intelligent—George’s brand of calm seems to encompass all of that, and as a result, he has a profound ministry of presence. In selfishness I’m really glad he’s retiring from Loring House because we have so much more for George to do at St Alban’s.”
The bishop is equally effusive in his praise. “From the moment George walked into Loring House to be the ‘temporary’ director of finance he consistently pointed us in the directions of care and responsiveness,” says Brown. “My own relationship with God is richer for the depth of his faith. I’m grateful for his continuing ministry as a deacon, and for what I know will be a life-long friendship between us.”
To that we say, Amen.