Meet Our Associate Pastors...

Minister Denise Statham serves as the Senior Associate Pastor of Living Water United Church of Christ. As a founding member of the church, her responsibilities have included preaching, teaching Bible Study, church-wide training retreats, monthly deacons training, writing devotional studies, and counseling members, families and community individuals as needed.

Denise is a licensed pastor currently completing the requirements for her long awaited ordination with the United Church of Christ (UCC), which is expected to happen in summer 2011. She serves as Member-at-Large on the Executive Board of United Black Christians (UBC). UBC is a special interest group that gives voice and vision to the UCC on behalf of Black churches.  Denise is also active with the Coalition for Multicultural and Multiracial Transformation, a part of the UCC’s Local Church Ministries Coalition.

Her educational background includes a Bachelor of Arts degree in Economics from Lafayette College, and a Master of Theological Studies degree, with a concentration in Christian Counseling, from Eastern Baptist Seminary (currently known as Palmer Seminary).  After Seminary, she pursued Clinical Pastoral Education at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania and completed her residency there in 2002. Most recently, she graduated from Neumann University in May 2010 with a Master of Science degree in Pastoral Counseling. She completed a two-year internship at Philadelphia School of Psychoanalysis as part of that program.  

Her career in the work world began with 24 years of selling elevator products for Otis Elevator Company when she first graduated from Lafayette College. She is currently the Administrative Chaplain at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania. She tells everyone that she is “still in the vertical transportation business, it’s just a different top floor.”

Denise has one adult daughter, Nicole, who resides with her in their hometown of Philadelphia, PA.  Nicole, who was also a founding member of Living Water, is very active in the church as well.

Minister Stephanie Wooten serves as the Associate Pastor of Administrative Affairs for Living Water United Church of Christ.  In addition to presiding over worship and preaching, she is responsible for the oversight of administrative ministries, which includes Finance, Nominations, Fundraising, Administration, Communications, Membership and others. She also serves as liaison to LGBT organizations external to the church.  Stephanie is a licensed pastor, having received licensure by the Philadelphia Association of the United Church of Christ in March 2011. Stephanie also serves on the Executive Committee for the Philadelphia Association as Member-at-Large.

Stephanie worked in the defense industry for well over a decade prior to answering God's call to pastoral ministry, essentially trading in her corporate attire for a cassock.  She is currently a full-time Seminarian at The Lutheran Theological Seminary at Philadelphia where she is pursuing a Master of Divinity degree (expected 2013). Her area of concentration is The Black Church. Stephanie has a passion for ministering to those who, for whatever reason, find themselves on the margins of society.  She anticipates being ordained by the UCC shortly after graduating from LTSP.

In addition to her Seminary studies, Stephanie graduated from Oklahoma State University with both a Bachelor of Science degree in Management Information Systems and a Master of Science degree in Telecommunications Management. In her former professional life, Stephanie worked in various technical fields including: advanced technical support, application programming, network operations & analysis, systems engineering and configuration management.

Stephanie has one adult son, Jordyn, and one granddaughter, Erika, who both reside in her native Oklahoma. Stephanie and her partner, Kheron, make their home in New Jersey.