George Pasek

“It’s a beautiful drive.”

That’s the memory that Pastor George Pasek takes with him as he reflects on the Cody to Powell and back commute he has made three to five times a week for the last two-and-a-half years in his ministry to the Union Presbyterian Church.

On Sunday, Jan. 31, Pasek presided as interim pastor at Union Presbyterian in Powell for the last time.

At 81, Pasek said simply, “It’s time. It has to do with my energy level.”

He registers a mixture of satisfaction and sadness as he steps back from a career of 48 years in the ministry.

Pasek also confesses to a measure of relief, centered squarely on the demands of ministering during a pandemic.

“We have tried to use technology. Oh, golly, we have tried,” he said.

In order to follow county and state health orders limiting the size of gatherings since March 2020, churches have responded in varying ways.

Pasek recalled that Union Presbyterian Church services were Zoomed from the dining room of his Cody home for a time, “even Holy Communion.”

Late in May, the session determined to try outside services on the lawn of Union Presbyterian Church, Pasek said.

“It was a wonderful thing,” he added.

Then with the onset of cooler temperatures in the fall, worship services moved back to the church sanctuary with the stipulation that everyone wear a mask.

The challenges in each setting have required continuing technological solutions. Pasek estimated that conducting church services has required two to three times as much energy since March.

“I have no more skill or energy to improve on what I have done,” Pasek said. “My whole concern has been to give the gospel in such a way that people could receive it.”

Pasek has filled the pulpit at Union Presbyterian Church in different capacities at different times, first serving as a temporary supply pastor between January and May of 2007 and again from August, 2008  to May of 2009. Following the departure of former pastor Jeff Baxter, Pasek accepted assignment as Union Presbyterian’s interim pastor, serving from May 2018 through the end of last month.

Pasek served in the U.S. Army’s Counterintelligence Corps from 1963-1966 before turning in the direction of the ministry. He graduated from Princeton Divinity School and was ordained a Presbyterian minister in 1973, right at the end of the Vietnam War.

His first pastorship was in Grand Island, Nebraska, and he also served Presbyterian churches in Ouray, Colorado, and Springfield, Oregon, in addition to two stints as pastor of Presbyterian churches in Greybull and Shell, Wyoming.

He retired from the Big Horn County churches when he was 65 to become chairman of the Committee on Ministry for the Presbytery of Wyoming. In that capacity, he filled in as pastor at a number of Wyoming Presbyterian churches.

His retirement as interim pastor at Union Presbyterian Church is being followed by a bit of a surprise engagement: He will be a guest pastor at Cody’s Christ Episcopal Church on Sunday, Feb. 7.

But Pasek’s focus as a full-time retiree will soon turn to favorite leisure pursuits. Cycling and skiing will take up as much of his time as he can devote, as well as his participation as a horn player with Northwest College musical groups. And he proudly notes, “I am a house husband.”

He and his wife Ann Marie, a nurse at Cody Regional Hospital, have two children nearby.

Son Karel is a dietician at Cody Regional Hospital, and daughter Katrina is a recent graduate with a master’s degree in museum studies from the University of Westminster in London. She is presently working for State Farm Insurance in Powell.

Pasek also has two children from a previous marriage: Tim Pasek, a land surveyor in Ouray, Colorado, and a daughter, Torine Yulish, in Oak Park, Illinois, a fundraiser for the Department of Economics at the University of Wisconsin.

As the search continues for a full-time pastor at Union Presbyterian Church, services will be led by volunteers and guest presenters.