“When the day of Pentecost arrived, they were all together in one place. And suddenly there came from heaven a sound like a mighty rushing wind, and it filled the entire house where they were sitting. And divided tongues as of fire appeared to them and rested on each one of them. And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other tongues as the Spirit gave them utterance.” -Acts 2:1-4
Abbot-Bishop Brian Ernest Brown, CWC is an artist, priest, contemplative, and wandering soul rooted in the Ozark Mountains. Born in Chicago in 1969 and raised on the Springfield Plateau of the Missouri Ozarks, his life has been shaped by beauty, struggle, pilgrimage, and the persistent call of Christ.
Trained first as an artist, Brian studied art history, humanities, and Latin at Drury College before apprenticing with a master glassblower. Over the years, he became an accomplished glass artist, founding Dancingbird Glassworks and Gallery and operating studio galleries throughout southwest Missouri and northwest Arkansas. The discipline of glass, with its fire, breath, patience, and transformation, became not only his craft but also a living metaphor for his spiritual life.
In the late 1990s, Brian experienced a profound call to sacramental Christian ministry. He completed theological studies through St. John the Beloved Orthodox Theological Seminary and Pax Christi College and Seminary. He was ordained deacon in 2004, priest in 2005, and consecrated bishop in 2006.
Brian’s ministry has unfolded within the Free Catholic tradition, where he has sought to live and proclaim a generous, inclusive, and deeply sacramental expression of the Christian faith. In 2004, he founded the Order of the Shepherd’s Heart and then in 2006 he founded the Ecumenical Free Catholic Communion, these ministries would ultimately combine and give rise to the Sacramental Community of the Coworkers of Christ, a new-monastic, ecumenical, and contemplative community centered on the Gospel, prayer, mercy, and shared life in Christ.
He founded Whithorn School of Theology, a spiritual continuation of the tradition of Celtic catholic monks of long ago in the formative education of women and men in the theology and philosophy of the Christian Faith. It was originally sanctioned and chartered by the Ecumenical Free Catholic Communion, registered in the State of Missouri, and operated under the auspices of the Order of the Shepherd’s Heart, an ecumenical Celtic catholic religious order. It would later become a seminary of Christ Catholic Church.
On September 9, 2007, Archbishop Karl Prüter sub-conditionally consecrated Bishop Brian Ernest Brown at the Cathedral of the Prince of Peace and entrusted to his care the episcopal protection, oversight and legacy of Christ Catholic Church and the See of the Prince of Peace.
For a time, Brian attempted to step down from his leadership roles in 2018 and enter a more nomadic and contemplative season of life as a Peregrinus Pro Christo, a pilgrim for Christ. Through travel, solitude, prayer, and study, he passed through a deep interior reckoning, drawing closer to Christian mysticism, sacramental theology, liberation theology, and the ancient practice of the Cure of Souls. Brian was ultimately called back to leadership by the faithful canonical members of the Holy Synod of Christ Catholic Church.
At the heart of Brian’s vocation is the creation of sanctuary for the wounded, the marginalized, and the spiritually homeless. His ministry has included work with the LGBTQ+ community, peacebuilding, the unhoused, hospice patients, and those walking through grief and bereavement. Whether in chapel, shelter, gallery, roadside, hospice room, or quiet conversation, his calling has remained the same: to create sanctuary and to bear witness to the healing presence of Christ.
Brian is the author and editor of several works related to Old Catholicism, the Independent Sacramental Movement, prayer, and new monasticism, including The Christ Catholic Book of Prayer, The Rule of the Order of the Shepherd’s Heart, The Directory of Autocephalous Bishops Catholic, The Liturgy Mass of the Beatitudes, and The Common Rule of the Sacramental Community of the Coworkers of Christ. He presently serves as the Abbot-Bishop of Christ Catholic Church and the Sacramental Community of the Coworkers of Christ.
He lives in Fayetteville, Arkansas, among the hills and hollers of the Ozarks, still a misfit mystic with an open heart and a free spirit, still seeking the sacred in all things, still making sanctuary wherever Christ leads.
For more information:
Email:
Info@ChristCatholic.Church