Missionary, CHN Positions Filled
Episcopal News Service. August 6, 1987 [87159]
NEW YORK (DPS, Aug. 6) -- Presiding Bishop Edmond L. Browning has named the Rev. Mark Harris to the position of coordinator of overseas personnel at the Episcopal Church Center and Gloria H. Brown of Los Angeles as the new staff officer for the Coalition for Human Needs.
Harris, who has been coordinator for ministry in higher education at the Center for the past five years, took up his new position on Aug. 1. As coordinator of overseas personnel, Harris is responsible for oversight of recruitment and training of overseas personnel, missionaries and Volunteers for Mission, as well as pastoral support for those persons, both in the field and for their return. His office responds to requests from the world-wide Anglican Communion for personnel assistance and encourages Episcopalians to offer themselves as missionaries to meet these expressed needs.
A 1967 graduate of the Episcopal Theological School who spent a semester as an exchange student at El Seminario Episcopal del Caribe in Puerto Rico, Harris began his involvement with the church overseas when he and his wife, Kathryn, served as missionaries in Puerto Rico in 1967-69. In the years since, he has been closely involved with a number of programs in the Diocese of Haiti and most recently has consulted with the Diocese of Cost Rica as they establish a chaplaincy at the national university in San Jose.
The Mobile, Ala., native received a B.A. from Tulane in 1961. Upon his return from missionary duty, he was associate chaplain at Canterbury House, University of Michigan, until 1972. He served as chaplain of the University of Delaware, 1972-78, and as interim pastor of a number of churches in Delaware from 1979-82. He was editor of the ministry in higher education journal, Plumbline, 1978-82.
Harris and his wife have one child.
Brown brings a solid and varied background in human services and community involvement to the post. The Coalition is an umbrella organization through which the racial, ethnic and social issues ministries of the National Mission unit identify issues of social and economic justice affecting their constituencies, help develop ministries and provide funding for these ministries. A primary focus for Brown will be fostering partnerships between dioceses, congregations and community groups in the development and implementation of ministries addressing basic human needs and issues of social justice.
A member of Christ the Good Shepherd Episcopal Church, Los Angeles, Brown developed and administered the Good Shepherd Center for Independent Living, a congregation-based center which specializes in rehabilitative services for the aged and disabled in the inner-city. She was an at-large member of the Coalition for Human Needs Commission, 1980-82, and, during her tenure, she was a member of the planning committee for the National Conference on Racism, which the Coalition sponsored in 1982. She has also served on several diocesan and national church committees and task forces.
Brown holds a B.S. degree in psychology from Wayne State University and an M.S. degree in rehabilitative counseling from San Francisco State University. She is currently working on a Ed.D. degree in counseling at the University of Southern California.
According to the Rev. Earl A. Neil, executive for National Mission and Brown's predecessor in the CHN position, which she takes up Sept. 1, "Gloria brings a strong commitment to social justice and a deep understanding of the Church's role in effecting this goal."