She’s still relatively new in town, but Rev. K. Casenhiser, who started at the Holy Trinity Episcopal Church in Tiverton last year, feels at home. Originally from California, she holds a masters degree in environmental science from Yale University, and found her true calling in college after working toward what she thought might be a career in music.

How has it been being in this community?

This community, when I first arrived, told me they were a family and that has been true. They’re family in the sense that anyone in Rhode Island knows anyone by one or two degrees of separation, but they’re also chosen family. They really show for each other when things are good and they need to celebrate and also when things are hard and they need to commiserate. That sense of family was immediately extended to me and has only deepened over the year — I think a good indicator of that is we have started a weekly book group.

You recently started a book group. Why?

Years ago, I was at a parish with a friend of mine who was a couple of years ahead of me in the process of being a priest and I asked him, ‘What’s the first thing you did when you came to this community?” He said, “I started a book group because when you read together, not only does that form your imagination, but also your social connection. The book group is distinctly not bible study. It is designed as mostly a fiction book group. We read literature that involves or grapples with themes about humanity, grief, loss, questioning and joy. We also read a couple of memoirs or things that might fall into that category. It’s a range, but it's not explicitly Christian books so that anyone in the community can participate, but also to emphasize that our faith is formed not only through the scriptural text that we read, but also through all other media and literature and art that we take in in our lives.

When did you find the calling to become the priest?

Prior to being called to the priesthood, I was a musician full-time, studying classical voice in college. I spent a lot of time in spaces where worship happens formally and informally, just by nature of being a musician that studies classical voice. It was music that brought me to the Episcopal Church. In college, I was invited to come to an Episcopal Church and become their choral scholar. I fell in love with the community and the priest was a woman. I had never seen anyone who was not a man in a collar holding that kind of religious authority. She became a mentor and that community became my first Episcopal community. Eventually, people in the community started to ask me if I had ever considered a call to priesthood and I said no. I didn't know that it was possible growing up. The call, I like to imagine it’s always been there, but for so many things in our life it needs to be witnessed before it becomes clear. And so many people were witnessing the call before I had language for it.

How does your background in music play into your role as a priest?

It is so critical. Here, we chant the Eucharist. They weren’t chanting when I arrived, but I did chant for them in my final interview. They fell in love with the reality of that's the tradition we come from. It's a beautiful gift that we have in our tradition. They also expressed a direct interest in recultivating our musical culture here. We now have two organists; our second organist, Lillian, is also a classical vocalist. Early in my time, during holy week, we were able to renew an ancient service, Tenebrae, which is a service of shadows during the week of the Passion and that service brought together musicians from all over Rhode Island. I think, by nature of that being in me and being part of the way that I relate to the sacred and the nature of understanding that music is part of what draws us out of ourselves, towards the divine, towards beauty, that's important. We received a small grant to hire a choral scholar to come and do special music anthems and things of that nature and to reanimate the choir.

Does environmental science play a role in your religious calling?

As priests, we are stewards of people and place. We are very near the Sakonnet River, as climate is changing the river and changing the shoreline. That means, as a church that is literally able to see and touch the river, we are responsible for its well-being, as well as the ways the climate will affect the people in this parish and in this place. If ever there were a flooding event, which we should expect to happen, we could be a fantastic gathering place. We’re elevated above ground level; we have air conditioning; we have heat; we have access to power. I’ve been asked to be part of writing the statewide climate resilience plan. Faith-based organizations are one of the key priority areas for the climate resilience plan, alongside town planners, nonprofits and the DEM.