Adventurous reverend takes charge

By Sarah Pearson
WHEN the Reverend Wendy Snook arrived in Cranbourne this month to take up her new post at the Uniting Church, she came with plenty of interesting stories to tell her congregation.
Mrs Snook comes to the Cranbourne church after serving as UCA Canberra region presbytery mission development worker. In that role, she visited 51different congregations ranging from Goulburn and Cookwell, two hours drive from Sydney, down to the Victorian border.
She enjoys sailing with her husband and two children. She also describes herself as an ‘avid patchwork quilter’ and has won a Viewer’s Choice Award for one of her quilts at the Canberra Quilt Show.
Mrs Snook looks forward to starting a patchwork quilting group in her community.
Before she trained as a minister, she first worked as a geologist specialising in diamond exploration, even helping to discover the Argyle diamond mine in Western Australia.
Mrs Snook was the first female chaplain in Australia’s armed forces, specifically with the Air Force. She worked part time for five years at the Pearce Air Base out of Perth, where all Air Force pilots are trained at one time or another, as are Navy, Army and interestingly, Singaporean Air Force pilots.
Mrs Snook has even experienced a barrel-roll in a PC9, the planes commonly used for the Roulettes. She has also done some industrial chaplaincy, flying in and out of the Laverton gold mine.
“I’ve had a varied career, let’s put it that way” Mrs Snook said.
During her time in these roles, Mrs Snook also served seven congregations in Western Australia. Prior to the Canberra region presbytery mission development worker position, she worked in a similar capacity, visiting nearly 60 congregations in the Perth Swan region.
“Cranbourne is an exciting area,” she said.
She plans to introduce multimedia to worship at Cranbourne Uniting Church, as well as encouraging young people within the congregation.
Mrs Snook officially began her tenure at Cranbourne Uniting Church on 22 February.