The Rev. Robert M. Cassels (Bob), 86, passed away following a years-long battle with esophageal cancer on Wednesday, August 21, 2024, at his home in Wilmington, Delaware. His beloved wife of nearly 63 years, Sheila, was at his side.
Bob was born in Cambridge, Massachusetts, on February 11, 1938, to John M. Cassels and Gladys J. Cassels (née Sorenson).
His early years were spent largely in Silver Spring, Maryland, and Greenwich, Connecticut. Following graduation from Greenwich High School in 1956, Bob attended Oberlin College in Ohio, majoring in religion and participating in numerous productions of Gilbert and Sullivan operas, fostering what would become a lifelong involvement in the theatre. It was at Oberlin that Bob also met Sheila (née Frazer); they graduated in 1960 and were married on August 26, 1961, in Moosic, Pennsylvania (with Sheila’s father, the Rev. William J. Frazer, performing the ceremony).
After obtaining an additional degree in theology from Yale Divinity School and being ordained as a minister in the United Church of Christ, Bob moved with Sheila to rural upstate New York, where he would serve his first parish, the Plainville Christian Church. During their time in Plainville, Bob and Sheila also started their family, welcoming a son John in 1963, a son Christopher in 1965, and a daughter Elizabeth in 1967. They also got a Shetland Sheepdog named Buffy, the first of many Shelties the family would own (among other things, a loving tribute to the Scots heritage on both of its sides).
In 1968, they moved to Plymouth, Massachusetts, where Bob worked as associate pastor at the Church of the Pilgrimage, UCC, while also completing studies for a master’s degree in sacred theology at Boston University. Subsequent moves took the family to Plymouth, Wisconsin (where Bob served the First Congregational Church); Alexandria, Virginia (for a 2-year program in clinical pastoral education); Jacksonville, Illinois (to serve the Jacksonville Congregational United Church of Christ); and Nutley, New Jersey (to serve St. Paul’s Congregational UCC). A devoted, loving father and proactive community leader throughout his life, Bob characteristically, finding on the move to Jacksonville no opportunities for his children to play soccer as they had done in Virginia, galvanized local support for and spearheaded the creation of a successful youth soccer association.
Called to the pastoral vocation out of abiding concern for the well-being of others—recognition of the needs and vulnerabilities of those facing struggles in their everyday lives—Bob was a tireless spiritual attendant to the communities he served. A talented orator, he was particularly known and prized for eloquent, insightful sermons that spoke with subtle power to the ongoing relevance of Christ’s example to the personal and social conditions his parishioners faced. Possessed of a holistic understanding of what constituted the health of a church in its present and its future, Bob in his practice particularly emphasized areas such as youth ministry/education, music and the arts, and spiritual counseling.
Having seen firsthand throughout his career the difference made by the quality of ministry a church receives during a passage from one pastor to the next, and afforded greater flexibility with his children no longer in the home, Bob followed his years at St. Paul’s by making a specialty practice of serving a number of congregations in northern New Jersey as an interim pastor, assisting them with sensitivity and grace in crucial periods of transition. Bob and Sheila eventually settled in a home in Upper Montclair, New Jersey, and he completed his full-time ministerial career aiding in another—more personal, existentially monumental—kind of transition, serving for 8 years as a chaplain with St. Barnabas Hospice and Palliative Care Center, a position he found especially rewarding and fulfilling.
A participant in community theater from his years in Illinois onward, Bob carved out time in the midst of his occupation of interim posts for what Sheila called a “do-it-yourself sabbatical,” earning an MFA in theatre from Montclair State University, and for the final dozen of their years in New Jersey he was active in the UCC Players, a theatre troupe housed in the church he and Sheila attended in Montclair.
In 2009, Bob and Sheila retired to their final home together, a lovely, sprawling house on a cul-de-sac in Wilmington, Delaware. This house provided ample wall space for the display of their extensive collection of art, much of it created by family members (artistic talent running on both sides). Its proximity to park spaces for walking and to the rich cultural offerings of the University of Delaware and the community at large made it a stimulating site in which to spend their retirement years. They particularly enjoyed visiting the Delaware Art Museum (in Wilmington), the Brandywine Museum of Art (in Chadds Ford, PA), and Longwood Gardens (in Kennett Square, PA). And it was in this house that Bob and Sheila had the joy of celebrating their 50th wedding anniversary, an event marked in the company of many extended family members and beloved lifelong friends.
A particularly gratifying professional and personal experience for Bob was to have been able to perform the wedding ceremonies of all three of his children and—in June 2023—to have the honor of traveling to Lubbock, Texas, and officiating at the wedding of the first of his grandchildren to marry.
Even after the passing of Bob and Sheila’s final Sheltie, Jock, Bob kept a stuffed toy Sheltie with him in his car, ever at his side wherever he went.
Bob was preceded in death by his parents and by his older brother, William S. Cassels.
He is survived by Sheila, by his three children, and by five grandchildren: Milo and Colin Nygren-Cassels and Owen, Dylan, and Wesley Aptekar-Cassels.
Memorial services will be held at New Ark United Church of Christ in Newark, Delaware, and at Union Congregational Church in Montclair, New Jersey. Dates and details will be shared here as they become available.
In lieu of flowers, the family asks that donations be offered in Bob’s honor to the Helen F. Graham Cancer Center & Research Institute, Newark, Delaware.
