The formation and vision of the Rev. Dr. Brandon Thomas Crowley, Episcopal Divinity School’s new Director of Theological Education and Senior Research Fellow in Religion, Homiletics, and Ecclesiology
Scriptural call stories often begin with a sudden, dramatic event - a burning bush, a blinding vision, an angel’s visitation. For the Reverend Doctor Brandon Thomas Crowley, it was a gradual unfolding, beginning with small moments on his great-grandmother’s front porch in Cedartown, Georgia and the awe he felt witnessing his faith leaders’ care for the community in times of mourning. From a young age, his call to ministry was clear. That call that would lead him to become a nationally recognized scholar, the respected pastor of the Historic Myrtle Baptist Church in West Newton, Massachusetts, and most recently, the Director of Theological Education and Senior Research Fellow in Religion, Homiletics, and Ecclesiology at Episcopal Divinity School (EDS).
Crowley’s early life was a microcosm of a deeply religious and proudly Black community. He was a child so devoted that at four years old, he convinced his pastor to baptize him against his grandparents’ initial wishes. He describes himself as being inseparable from the altar, even sitting crisscrossed in the pulpit right at the feet of whoever was preaching on Sunday. This wasn't an act of adoration for a single figure, but a fascination with the work of ministry itself. His grandfather, a Baptist deacon, nurtured this nascent interest, taking him to revivals where other pastors would also welcome young Brandon as he sat at their feet.
A defining moment of his early call came after a violent crime that left a member of his community dead. Crowley watched as Black clergy arrived on the scene as the community gathered in grief and frustration that the police did not do more to prevent this violence. In a sea of grief, anger, and communal tension, he witnessed how the concerned Black clergy of his town facilitated meaning making for his neighbors. “They started the community on a journey towards healing, not just through empty prayers and looking like clerics, but by having the respect of the community. They gave us hope,” he recalls. Crowley felt called to that ability to accompany, to make meaning, to offer hope and healing. That is what he wanted to do.
Crowley’s call was also shaped by a childhood filled with rich Black history and culture. While his school system didn't teach Black history, his family did, sharing stories of figures like Emmett Till and Claudette Colvin at the dinner table. This upbringing instilled in him a deep pride in his Black identity and a profound understanding of the role of the Black church as a central, humanizing force in the face of racism and oppression.
Crowley’s early call found its fullest expression on his great-grandmother’s front porch. As a young child, he would “play church” wearing her nightgown as vestments and a dish towel as a handkerchief while the neighborhood kids gathered on the steps as his congregation. When a neighborhood boy began to mock him, he ran inside, ready to quit. Even in this grief, his great-grandmother held him and pushed him back out to the porch, gesturing to him: “I'm watching.” Crowley remembers her defiant affirmation as a moment he draws both strength and courage now as a Black queer Christian leader. That moment was an early lesson in challenging the institution of the church when it failed to live up to its values.
This sense of subversion and challenge would become a central theme of his life’s work. As a teenager, his love for Jesus was unwavering, but a fiery sermon he heard against homosexuality left him confused and afraid, nearly questioning Jesus’ love for him – the love he built his whole life around. Simply “praying the devil away” felt like an insult to his faith and to Jesus’ love. This crisis led him to the public library, where he stumbled upon the Rev. Dr. Kelly Brown Douglas’ Sexuality and the Black Church. For Crowley, Douglas’ work was utterly transformational.
Crowley’s twenties were spent straddling two worlds: the spiritual home of the Black church and the affirming queer spaces, which were predominantly white and lacked the passion and sense of community he had become accustomed to. He felt a call to help Black churches become more affirming without losing their unique identity—a call to “queer” the church. “Queering” — as a verb — is how Crowley describes the act of subversion that fosters equity and dismantles systems of oppression within the church and beyond, whether they be related to gender, race, sexual orientation, ability, socioeconomic status, or any other identity that has been marginalized. Queering church, for Crowley, is what it looks like for the church – which doesn’t always live up to its values – to catch up to the radical love of God.
Crowley’s personal and intellectual journey as a scholar in religion, theology, and queer theory has positioned him to bridge what has become a significant divide between academic theological education and the local church. In his perspective, the church on the ground is both impacted by and active in addressing injustice, but could benefit from the contemplative, critical thinking of the academy. Conversely, the academy has become insular, with a “preoccupation with cyclical knowledge” that reaches others in the academy, but never the people doing the work of God at the local level. The result is a cycle of anti-intellectualism in the church and anti-spirituality in the academy.
Crowley’s experience positions him to creatively engage this tension. He has taught courses at Harvard Divinity School, Boston University, Emory University, the Episcopal Seminary of the Southwest, and the Meadville Lombard Theological Seminary, always with a focus on how theory can be put into practice. His new role at EDS offers a platform to continue this vital work.
Crowley sees EDS as an institution that, by moving beyond the confines of traditional seminary, can decolonize theological education and creatively meet the needs of a changing church. Free from the constraints of federal funding, EDS has the opportunity to do prophetic work, empowering future leaders with a theological education that is both intellectually rigorous and deeply connected to the needs of the real world.