Bishop Rayford B. High, Jr. will ordain Lisa Neilson to the priesthood at 11 am on Saturday, October 22 at St. Thomas Episcopal Church in College Station. The festal color is white.
Neilson graduated from Syracuse University and spent nine years on active duty as an Army officer, then worked for BNSF Railway for over nineteen years. She met her husband, Bob, while serving in the Army in Korea, and they have been married for 28 years. They have two adult children. Heather and her husband Jeremy live in Fort Worth and have a son and daughter, Caleb and Peyton. Ian is a student at the University of North Texas majoring in psychology.
Neilson is a cradle Episcopalian who was baptized and confirmed in the Diocese of Colorado. She was active in the Episcopal Campus Ministry at Syracuse University and served in a parish near the campus as a Lay Eucharistic Minister, lector and clerk of the vestry. She and her family have been members of St. Martin-in-the-Fields, Keller, for 18 years. She has been a Sunday school teacher, worship leader, lay eucharistic minister, lay eucharistic visitor, vestry member, and senior warden.
Neilson attended Brite Divinity School part time for three years while working at BNSF Railway and transferred in 2014 to Virginia Theological Seminary in Alexandria, VA. She served at the Washington National Cathedral in Washington, D.C. until she graduated this May with a Master of Divinity degree.
Neilson accepted a call to serve as College Missioner with the Canterbury Episcopal Student Center at Texas A&M University in College Station and Blinn College and started working there shortly after her graduation from seminary.
It may be helpful to note that the Aggies play an away game on the weekend of Neilson’s ordination.