The Rev. Jason Santalucia has been installed as the new pastor at St. Andrew Presbyterian Church in Groton.

A native of the Mid-Atlantic, Santalucia and his family come to the area after eight years in Lexington, Ky. He said he felt it was a good time for a change, and with his children approaching their teenage years, he didn’t want to uproot them during high school.

He said his journey to the ministry was a gradual development, with an influential pastor during his graduate school years cracking open the door for him.

“I’m really kind of an introvert by nature, and I always sort of assumed you had to be an extreme extrovert to be a pastor because that’s how most of the ones that I knew were, and when I was in grad school, my wife and I started going to a church, and the head pastor there was more introverted than I was,” he said. “It was the first time I sort of looked in someone in that position and thought, ‘You know, I could do that.’”

Santalucia’s favorite part about being a pastor is being able to listen to parishioners open up to him. It’s a privilege to be a part of people’s lives, he said.

He said he also enjoys leading the Sunday morning worship ceremonies, which he didn’t expect as an introvert.

Since moving to Connecticut, he has been getting to know the members of his church and found the community to be warm and welcoming. He said the church is trying to develop an outward focus to reach out to people and groups in the region who need it most.

“I think there’s a general feeling in the church that we want to be more out in the community, and that was one of the things that attracted me to it in the first place,” he said.

Santalucia also commended St. Andrew’s active youth program, saying the kids are very engaged in the church and he would like to give them more support for ministry projects that they’d like to start.