The Ministerial Search Committee is excited to present Bryant Bossler Brown as our candidate for minister of Thomas Paine UU Fellowship. Bryant received a Master of Divinity degree from Moravian Seminary in December and currently is serving as Parish Ministerial Intern at the UU Church of Annapolis, Maryland. He also attended the Starr King School for Ministry.
Bryant wants to serve a congregation that is hoping and planning to grow—that is what attracted him to TPUUF! Knowing that growth might involve change and risk, Bryant plans to be respectful of the feelings of all our members as well as being mindful of the congregation’s financial and physical realities. As a longtime UU himself (over 35 years), Bryant plans to be visible in our community and the world beyond as a courageous witness to Unitarian Universalist values, with a special emphasis on the critical difference those values can make in one’s life. He believes that if more people knew about Unitarian Universalist fellowships and congregations, more people would become UU’s.
Bryant’s theology is based on “a belief that none of us can wrap a human mind around what is truly transcendent; that each of us may have some partial idea of that which is beyond our own time-space-matter experience, and that we can learn from each other and from insights from the past.”
Bryant’s highest priorities in ministry are worship, social action, religious education, and community building. He hopes to be part of a church that is welcoming and accepting, and that actively reaches out to help people find this faith by using all the means it can imagine.
Thirty-five years ago, Bryant’s wife, Maggie, first told him that he would make a good Unitarian Universalist minister. In his life, Bryant has sought a variety of work and educational experiences to test out Maggie’s prediction. These experiences include radio news director, Rhode Island state government; school district computer coordinator, New Hampshire; civilian computer specialist, US Army, based both in the states and in Germany; founder of the UU Fellowship in Frankfurt, Germany; computer teacher at an aluminum smelter operation in Nigeria; chaplaincies at both a regional trauma hospital and a behavioral health facility; and his current position of Parish Ministerial Intern at UU Church of Annapolis. The members of the Search Committee feel strongly that Bryant’s many experiences will serve him well as minister.
