🌿 When One Call Ends and Another Begins

📍 Christ the King, Sturgeon Bay & Holy Nativity, Jacksonport

In Door County, ministry sometimes looks like equal parts shoreline, sanctuary, and strong coffee. And admist the waves and the cuppa’joes, two congregations are stepping into a season that holds both goodbye and welcome at the same time.

Fr. Olin Sletto

After nearly a decade of shared life together, the Rev. Olin Sletto will conclude his ministry with Christ the King in Sturgeon Bay and Holy Nativity in Jacksonport this April, as the Rev. Glenn Kanestrom prepares to step into the role of vicar beginning May 1.

🕊️ A Call That Came After “Retirement”

Fr. Olin’s path to Door County didn’t begin with the Episcopal Church. His path wandered, faithfully, through decades of Lutheran ministry, global mission work, and eventually, what was supposed to be retirement.

After 41 years in ordained ministry, including 15 years as a missionary in the Central African Republic and leadership in global mission across Africa and Madagascar, he and his wife Connie settled in Jacksonport in 2014. The plan was simple: rest, read, and enjoy the shoreline (and it is a georgeous shoreline!).

But as it turns out, there’s only so much reading a vocation will tolerate.

Through the full communion agreement between Lutherans and Episcopalians, a new call emerged—this time, right in his own backyard. In 2016, Fr. Olin said yes again, becoming vicar to a parish that had been waiting.

Over the past ten years, that “yes” has taken shape in quiet, steady ways: pastoral presence, thoughtful preaching, and a kind of leadership that doesn’t draw attention to itself but still changes a place all the same.

His ministry will be celebrated with a final liturgy at Christ the King on April 26, followed by a shared meal at Holy Nativity—because of course it will! Some things are just how a Wisconsin church says thank you.

🌊 A New Chapter, Already Taking Shape

Fr. Glenn Kanestrom

Beginning May 1, the Rev. Glenn Kanestrom and his wife Jane will arrive in Door County, bringing with them decades of parish ministry—and a similar instinct to keep listening for where God might be leading next.

Fr. Glenn has served congregations across the country, most recently as Rector of St. Paul’s in Marinette. After more than 30 years in full-time ministry, he began discerning what a different pace of priesthood might look like.

Not an ending. Just a shift.

When he reached out to the Diocese of Wisconsin about part-time ministry, the fit with Christ the King and Holy Nativity became clear quickly. Between a shared love of music, sailing, and the outdoors, and a parish ready for its next chapter, the call felt less like a transition and more like a continuation.

The Kanestroms will make their home in the vicarage at Christ the King—a space that, after years of occasional use, has been brought back to life through the work of local contractors and parish volunteers. In the final stretch, it became something of a community project—equal parts renovation and anticipation.

🌱Gratitude for Both Families:

Moments like this highlight how much we have to be greatful for, not only at the parish level but as a diocese, and in the way God moves through his kingdom.

There is gratitude—for ten years of faithful presence, for a priest who asked “what next?” and meant it.

There is also hope—for what is just beginning to take shape, for relationships not yet formed, for the ways God tends to show up in ordinary places with surprising timing.

In Door County, both are being held together right now, and it’s a privilage to stand with them as a diocese seeing the blend of the end of one hymn into the beginning of another.