Clergy & Staff

Priest in Charge

Rev. Paul “Chris” Christopherson has been priest in charge since 2020. He is a native Minnesotan, ordained priest in 1972 for the Bishop of Minnesota by the Bishop of New York, where he served as curate at St Thomas Fifth Avenue. Paul then had a dual career on Wall Street and as a supply priest. In 1992, he started New Vernon Associates, an institutional equity research firm he sold in 2008. In 2010, he published “Pants On Fire: Cutting Through the Biggest Lies of 21st Century American Plutocracy”.

Paul is a past board member of the Episcopal Preaching Foundation, and of the General Theological Seminary, where he served on the executive committee and chaired the investment committee. In 2016, Paul was licensed a supply priest in Connecticut and has served ten parishes, including St Michael’s, Litchfield; St Paul’s, Woodbury; St Andrew’s, Kent; and St John’s, Washington.

Paul (“Chris”) and his wife Ellen (“Dede”) were married at St James in New York in 2012 and moved to Litchfield in 2016. By a previous marriage, Paul has a daughter and three grandchildren. He graduated from Williams (BA); Episcopal Divinity School (MDiv); and Columbia (MBA).

Rev. Canon Lance Beizer

Rev. Canon Lance Beizer had a long and varied career in the law, in academia, and as a US Naval Officer. Then, after seminary at the Church Divinity School of the Pacific, Lance was ordained Priest in 2005. He served two California parishes, including as Canon-vicar at Trinity Cathedral in San Jose.

He and Ann were married in 2007, and live in Canaan. Lance has long served the worship and pastoral life of St. John’s, including taking frequent services, while Ann has served on the Vestry. The couple share a love of cruising.