Noble Road Presbyterian Church welcomes new pastor

Meredith Anne White preaches at Noble Road Presbyterian Church.

Noble Road Presbyterian Church (NRPC) has announced that Meredith Anne White has been called to serve as its new pastor. In a way, White is returning home—she grew up in Cleveland Heights, and even attended Girl Scouts at the church. She is one of those rare individuals who has successfully managed to make the transition from east side to west side, and now lives with her partner, Susan Strohm, in Lakewood. 

White earned a B.A. in peace and conflict studies from Kent State University in 1996, and received a Master of Divinity from Louisville Presbyterian Theological Seminary in 2003. Underscoring her versatility, White has worked as a church secretary at Fairmount Presbyterian, coordinator of a women’s center, a Hebrew tutor, and a chaplain intern in a hospital. She served for seven years as organizing pastor for the Phoenix Project New Church Development, a storefront church in Lakewood that provides a safe space for worship for people “on the fringe of society."

Most recently, White has held the position of praise and worship leader for the Sunday evening service at Old Stone Church in Cleveland. She plays the guitar during worship and joins other NRPC musicians to accompany hymns. She has been preaching at NRPC since the previous pastor left, and is very willing to roll up her sleeves and jump right in to help with the church's multiple ministries. According to parishioners, White is warm and compassionate, and fits in well with the longstanding progressive activist spirit at NRPC, the first open and welcoming Presbyterian church in northern Ohio.