After a night of cheap jokes and raucous laughter, Doris MacGregor, 59, felt overwhelmed. In a large hall upstairs at Grace Lutheran Church, transformed frequently for Meals on Wheels and other activities she oversees, MacGregor went along with all the jokes; “tolerated” them.
Members of the church and the Culver City community were celebrating MacGregor’s departure from 32 years of service in the ministry.
“I was blown away,” MacGregor said.
Macgregor began working at the church 32 years ago as a custodian and from there, began extending her services at Grace Lutheran. “I started teaching Sunday school and just continued to become more involved in committee work and fundraising in the church,” she said, adding, “I didn’t find it, the church found me.”
She became a youth and family parish worker nearly 18 years ago, her duties included conducting Sunday school and greeting visitors from the homeless in need of a meal to people wishing to donate food. In addition, she served as a spokeswoman of sorts, getting to know other church leaders and facilitating relationships between those organizations.
MacGregor, who has seen seven pastors and six music directors during her tenure, has heavily involved herself in the community since day one, putting together field trips for senior citizens and doing work through groups like the Optimist Club.
“[The Optimist Club’s] whole platform is working with youth, and what our specific club did every year is we visited four to five hospitals and we would bring brand new stuffed animals and we would go around to the hospitals and specifically give the gifts to the children,” she explained.
A supporter of the people she surrounds herself with, MacGregor once cut off her hair for a friend taking chemotherapy and she attends Toastmasters with a church member who needed a push in the right direction.
“Many of us in West Los Angeles do not have our extended families close to us so in a sense, the people in a faith community become part of your extended family,” she said.
Rev. Margaret Zamorano, a long-time friend of MacGregor, describes her colleague as “stern, but not forceful,” and mentions that it has been a “gem working with and knowing her.”
In retirement, MacGregor hopes to focus on her husband and three kids. “My immediate family in a sense had to be tolerant of my time away from home and had to be more invested in our home life when I was not there, she said.”
She says her time at Grace Lutheran has been invaluable and although it is not over, she says she will miss the people and relationships.
“What do we say?” MacGregor asked herself. “When things are bad, to be patient because in the end things will turn around.”