Mark Brown: CEO of the Bible Society in New Zealand.

Former National Director of Scripture Union. Anglican deacon, soon to be priested.

Pioneer church planter in the virtual world. BA. MA.

Well on the way to becoming a Doctor of Business Administration.

Master criminal.

OK. Where that last qualification is concerned, we’re stretching things a little. But Mark definitely had aspirations in that direction...

Mark Brown was born in 1972 in a British military hospital in Germany (his dad, Robert, was serving with the Royal Air Force at the time), then spent his early years in Rugby in the UK. When he was nine, his family emigrated to Perth in Western Australia.

Mark has, through his dad, a Jewish whakapapa, and still has his grandfather’s prayer shawl. But in the new world Robert chose to let such things slip away, and Mark and his younger brother were raised in a solidly secular home.

So secular, in fact, that as a young teen Mark made a decision that, where Christianity was concerned, he’d be proactively against it.

“I had a good friend who was a Christian – a ‘Bappo’ – and I thought his belief was just bizarre. I would harass him about this.”
Mark also made the conscious decision back then that a life in crime offered him better prospects than any other line of work going.

“Not that I was aiming to be a petty thug, mind you: not someone who would take a handbag for a few dollars.

“I was going to be an organised criminal. I used to read books; I used to immerse myself in this world where I could learn the trade. I was quite serious, and my crime was escalating.”

Thieving, mostly, preceded by careful casing of the targeted joints.

He wasn’t mug enough to risk petty shoplifting.

Or so he told himself. Except this one day, he ducked into a shop – and slipped a pair of sunglasses into his bag.

Oi, said the shopkeeper, as he frogmarched Mark into a backroom, before calling the police.

Never mind Mark’s intentions of a life in crime: when you’re 14, this is significant.

To make matters worse, just as Mark was being escorted to the police car, some of his school mates, who had after-school jobs in the local shops, were finishing work for the day.

They spilled out on to the streets – to see Mark, tears streaming down his face, being bundled into the back of a police car. He was doubly humiliated. Shamed. Stricken to the core.

“I thought: It’s over. I’ve had my go, and I’ve stuffed up.”

At the station he was charged with shoplifting. His father was summoned, and took him home.

“As soon as we pulled into our drive, I opened the car door and ran. And as I ran, all I could think about was ending my life.”

About then, as he was blindly running, something happened: a strange word he’d never heard before jumped into his mind. A word that kept repeating, and grew in intensity.

That word was: Demonic.

“I had no idea what that meant. No concept at all. Yet that word became more and more insistent. It was pounding on my brain.

“I thought: what is going on? I don’t have time for this. This is ridiculous. I was distraught. I had to go to court. I’d been charged. My life, as far as I could tell, was ruined.

“Eventually my father caught up with me and dragged me home. He wasn’t angry: he was unbelievably concerned for his oldest son. What was happening to him?

“So when I finally entered the family home I grabbed a dictionary. I wanted to find out about this word that was thumping in my head.

“The definition I read was this: ‘Demonic: possessed by a demon.’

“That’s when I had an extraordinary, existential moment. I thought: ‘Who am I? What am I? What does this mean?’

“Possessed by a demon? My whole world, my whole world view, came collapsing down. My whole life, my solid non-Christian upbringing, had been predicated on there being no spiritual realm.

“Yet here, in an instant, I was faced with the dramatic reality, the possibility of a spiritual world.

“I rang my Christian mate, whom I’d mocked for years, whose house I was on the way to when this had happened. I remember asking him:

“What can your God do for me? What can your God do for me?

“He said: ‘Mark: come before God. Tell him your sins – and invite him into your life.’

“I thought: I’ve got to give this a go. I’ve got to try something. I was desperate. Desperate!

“So I went into my room, and closed the door. I’d never prayed before. I had no understanding of how you talked to this God – if He existed, that is. I got on my knees, and I just started talking – into thin air, as I thought.

“I started sharing my sins, the things that I had done wrong. That took a while. And then, rather mechanically – because this was what my Christian best mate had told me to do – I invited Jesus into my heart, into my life.

“And that’s when something quite profound happened.

“The Holy Spirit came upon me. God entered my life, and I was washed clean.

“I felt overwhelmed with joy and love. I felt light, and joyous. I had a new life, a new beginning. I was born again.

“All I wanted to do was hug – and all I wanted to do was serve. From a selfish beginning, all I yearned for was selflessness. It wasn’t about me anymore. In an instant, I had discovered God.”
Mark started his Christian life at his mate’s Baptist Church. But one day, when he was 18, Mark was invited to the local Anglican Church – and he discovered an immediate and deep attraction to things Anglican. Not so much for theological reasons: it was the architecture he appreciated.

Because across the crowded pews he spotted a particularly attractive young woman.

“I thought… gee, she’s nice. I might give this Anglican Church a go.”

By the time he was 21 he and Louise had married.

Mark hadn’t covered himself in academic glory at high school. But he had been heavily into sport – as a teenager he’d played fullback for the WA junior rep rugby team, and trialled for the Aussie junior team – art, and theatre.

That out-of-classroom action was enough to persuade the WA Academy of Performing Arts that despite his marks, he was worth a punt for an arts management course.

He didn’t see that through, though. Too young, and besides, he’d not only felt an attraction to the Anglican Church – he’d also experienced a calling to the priesthood.

“I woke up one day – and very clearly, I heard God’s voice saying: ‘You are going to be a priest.’

“Now to put that into context: this wasn’t something I was seeking, and there are only a few times when I’ve felt God speak so directly.”

He got the thumbs-up from Peter Carnley, the then Archbishop of Perth, and, at the age of 19, Mark started to train for the Anglican priesthood.

Again, it was a false start. Two and a half years into a three year course he bailed out – mostly, he reflects, because he was surrounded by much older men and women.

Making that call to quit was tough, and he wrestled with the consequences of that decision for the next 16 years.

“I had the feeling: God, you called me. I still feel called – so what’s going on?”

He didn’t let those thoughts slow him down, though.

Mark did an 18-month Clinical Pastoral Education course, and then spent a year as a lay chaplain in a psychiatric ward of a major hospital. He’d finished his theology studies by this time, and graduated with a BA. He spent the next two years reeling in a Master’s in Art Therapy, which qualified him to practise as a psychotherapist.

He hit on some interesting discoveries in that art therapy field, too. The psychiatric wards had patients who would talk “the most amazing Christian content.” Most were manifesting a delusion that psychiatrists label as ‘religiosity’.

But some, Mark suspected, were reporting genuine experiences of Christian mysticism.

“I said: How can we tell which is which? So I developed an assessment. If you get these folk to do a set of simple drawings, showing how they relate to water – through that you can determine whether it’s a genuine Christian expression, or it’s florid psychosis.

“I was able to show that there actually is a difference, which you can detect through their drawings but not through their speech.”

He worked for a further 18 months as a psychotherapist in the psych ward of a hospital – then, following a chance tea-room conversation, he took a job leading the children and youth work at one of the bigger Perth Uniting churches.

He spent three years in pastoral ministry, then at the age of 26 landed a job managing 60 high-school chaplains for WA’s Youthcare programme.

“About a year into my role with Youthcare, I felt God say: Not management. Leadership.

“So to skill myself up, I started doing an MBA. Now MBAs are really fresh; no crusty old theory stuff. It’s very practical – you study while you’re working.

“Of course: I then began to see holes, and I started to say: why can’t we deal with this? But I wasn’t in a position to change anything. So two years in I thought: I’m ready for my own ship.”

When he spotted an ad for National Director of Scripture Union in New Zealand, he didn’t need prompting. He applied – and at the age of 30, took up the reins of that Wellington-based job.

“One of my key skills is transforming an organization. I like to come to an organization, and say: we could be here – and then be able to make that happen. Set the vision, and then bring the organization along that road. On the other hand, when an organisation is in the groove, I’m less attracted.”

At Scripture Union, Mark oversaw a doubling of staff numbers, and a big increase in income. Three years on, he felt SU was on track. Time, then, for a new challenge.

Eighteen months ago, when the Bible Society advertised for a new national CEO, Mark felt he’d found the challenge he was seeking.

Leadership. Mark had long felt called to that. A couple of years ago, he sensed a refinement of that calling – a specific challenge to become a thought leader.

“This was the sense of God saying… I want you to start influencing agendas.”

He’s working that out in research – for example, at the Bible Society Mark has commissioned a researched survey of Bible engagement in New Zealand – through being a ‘ministry entrepreneur,’ and especially through his pioneering work in virtual ministry.

Mark’s Brownblog http://brownblog.info (subtitle: fresh thinking about Christian ministry), is getting thousands of visits each month – and, most dramatically, there’s the Second Life Anglican Cathedral.

That leaves us with one small question. How, after so many years away, did Mark find his way back into the Anglican Church? The Diocese of Wellington’s Deacon for Virtual Ministry, no less, headed in November for ordination to the priesthood?

It happened like this: When the Brown family came to New Zealand four years ago, they looked for a church – and settled on a Presbyterian one.

But that’s when Mark felt that nagging feeling come surging back: God, why are you calling me? And it’s still unfulfilled?”

About then he stumbled upon a small book called Anglicanism. Reading that made him realise he didn’t know the Anglican Church as well as he’d imagined he had.

“I realized, for example, how important the Bible is to Anglicans. I realized, too, that the Prayer Book is just drenched in Scripture. It was A-ha moment stuff.

Having read the book Mark now wanted, as it were, to see the movie. To re-engage with Anglicanism first hand.

The way to do that, he figured, would be to go straight to the top. He’d check out Wellington’s St Paul’s Cathedral.
So one Sunday he trooped along to Evensong.

There was a full-strength choir, and the whole liturgical bit. Hardly what you’d expect a guy with evangelical tendencies to get off on.

But God moves in mysterious ways. Because Mark found himself in tears that night, undone by the beauty of what he was experiencing.

“I was just so deeply moved. I had an experience of God’s presence – in the Cathedral, of all places.

“I’ve been part of churches that do the Hillsong stuff – but after all these years that feels like water off a duck’s back to me. And here I was, in tears at this choral singing.

“So I grabbed Frank Nelson (the Dean) – he didn’t know me – and said: I’ve got to talk to you.

“I told him what had happened, and said: I need to explore this.

“He’s a great pastor. We started a conversation, and I’ve been at the Cathedral ever since.”

By this time, too, he’d already struck up a friendship with Bishop Richard Randerson, who had welcomed Mark when he arrived in New Zealand.

“One night after this Richard and I were chatting away over a meal – and he came out and said, ‘Have you thought about the priesthood?’

“I said, ‘Sitting in a lounge, drinking tepid tea, listening to hernia stories? I have incredible respect for you guys – but that’s not my thing’.”

Nonetheless, that conversation had stirred him up. It bugged him, partly because Frank Nelson had already raised the same question.

Mark sent an email to Bishop Tom Brown. Told him what had been on his heart all these years.

They chatted. One thing led to another. And Mark was introduced to the idea of self-supporting ministry. That sounded just the ticket.

Mark went through the discernment process, and when he learned that he’d been accepted, Bishop Tom Brown was faced with an exuberant candidate.

“I didn’t hug him… but it got pretty close. It was a release for me. I was able to fulfil my calling – but it didn’t require me to dump everything, and become a parish priest.”

He was ordained to the diaconate in December last year (“That was very special for me.”) and this November he’ll be ordained priest.

In one way, that will be the end of a journey begun almost 20 years earlier.

In another, it’s just one more milestone in a remarkable life.

A paper by Mark Brown, ‘Christian Mission to a Virtual World,’ can be downloaded from his website:

http://brownblog.info/wp-content/plugins/wp-downloadMonitor/user_uploads/Christian_Mission_to_a_Virtual_World.pdf