Reconnecting?

For the last couple of years I have thought a great deal about trying to reconnect with people from the past—former classmates, co-workers, lay men and women of the churches I’ve pastored, etc.  Even with the great resources of the Internet I am finding it much more difficult than I had imagined.  Several reasons for this are emerging:

1.  Many of those with whom I would like to reconnect are people who were very helpful to me while I was pastoring various churches.  Others were those with whom I shared good times and bad.  How about the many couples whose marriage ceremonies I conducted?  How about those whose family member’s funeral I conducted?  I did not keep in touch with them following a pastorate out of ministerial courtesy to the next pastor.  Surely if there is a “Statute of Limitation” on my keeping in touch with former parishioners, it has long since passed.  Now when names come to mind of those with whom I would like to correspond, I am forced to remember that some of them would be age 110 if they were living.  Others would be in their 80s and 90s.  They are deceased or in nursing homes and probably would not be able to remember me.  I called one man with whom I was close during the Brooksville pastorate and he asked, “Richard who?”

2.  How about those nearer my age and younger?  The women have married names which I do not know.  The men have scattered to the winds.  Many are divorced and remarried and care little about reconnecting with someone who is a minister.  Even many my age and younger have passed on to their eternal reward.

So, I am beginning to wonder if the effort to reconnect is even worth the time and effort.  After all, they haven’t tried to find me.  I would be easier to find than most of the ones I’m looking for anyway.  A single call to the UMC Florida Conference office would yield all the information one would need.  Then, too, one may find my trail on the Internet through searches on Google, Whitepages, Facebook, and a number of other sites.  There are not many Richard Humstons to chase down.

Even when I think I am having some success in locating someone I am disappointed when they email me their picture or I see it on Facebook.  Those people can’t be the ones I knew in the past—they are way too old!