The evangelical theologian, writer, professor and pro-life pioneer Harold O. J. Brown died last weekend after a long fight with cancer.Quoted in the Christianity Today obituary of Dr. Brown, Mike Kruger, academic dean of Reformed Theological Seminary, said Brown was "one of the brightest thinkers that this generation of Christians has seen. He has been a monumental influence over the last 30 years in American evangelicalism...."
...Kruger said that Brown's "most central place of influence is rightly considered the pro-life movement. He not only anticipated the problem before abortion was legalized, but he has been one of the great organizers of actions to deal with the problem."
In 1975, two years after Roe v. Wade, Brown co-founded Christian Action Council (now Care Net) with former surgeon general C. Everett Koop to work for legal and political solutions against abortion. Over time, it developed into a network of pregnancy care centers.
[Melinda] Delahoyde credits Brown, along with Koop and apologist Francis Schaeffer, with realizing "we needed a voice against this horrendous taking of life of the unborn. And Joe was so able both through his work in theology and philosophy to say, This is not just a woman's private choice. This has to do with our deepest views about God, man, and what it means to be a human being...."
...Brown's books include The Protest of a Troubled Protestant (1969), Christianity and the Class Struggle (1970), Death Before Birth (1977), The Reconstruction of the Republic (1977), Heresies: The Image of Christ in the Mirror of Heresy and Orthodoxy from the Apostles to the Present (1984), and Sensate Culture (1996).
But Brown was perhaps better known for his work at magazines. He served on the staffs of Human Life Review, Christianity Today, The Religion and Society Report, and Chronicles...
The CT piece can be read here but, for a fuller picture of Dr. Brown's work, I encourage you to check around the web for some of his articles. One excellent source, as mentioned above, is The Religion & Society Report which Dr. Brown had written for and edited since 1989.
Allan Carlson, President of the Howard Center for Family, Religion & Society and John Howard, Senior Fellow, called their colleague Dr. Brown “a hero of Christian faith, service and scholarship.” And they joined together to encourage others to read through the substantial number of Brown's Religion & Society Report articles available online. I concur.
Through The Religion & Society Report, Dr. Brown offered uncompromising, but civil analyses of cultural controversies and public issues from a Christian framework. Issues discussed included the relationship of civil authority to the Bible, abortion and euthanasia, medical ethics, theological trends in American and European churches, religious liberty, and reports on the persecution of Christians and other faith groups in foreign lands. Dr. Brown’s articles frequently built understanding between believers from different denominations in areas of sexual morality, bioethics and family life.
In Dr. Brown’s last article (“No Diga Mentiras”) in The Religion & Society Report [written for the fall issue of 2006], he writes a personal history of the pro-life movement and sends a heartfelt message of encouragement to all of us. Joe exhorts, “I write these deeply personal lines to encourage others not to despair, but to sound the clarion call to him [George W. Bush] and all leaders, No diga mentiras, diga la verdad! Do not tell lies, tell the truth!”
Death Before Birth served as my own introduction to Dr. Brown and it was a good one. In the days when very few evangelicals were writing about abortion, this book was a special source of wisdom, challenge and effective assistance. Later, when Claire and I became involved in the Christian Action Council, we met Dr. Brown personally through the introduction of Curt Young, the young man who Dr. Brown had appointed to lead the fledgling organization. It was Brown's leadership in forming the CAC, with its eventual development of hundreds of Christian pregnancy care centers, that is probably his most important contribution to the pro-life movement.
So, thank you, Lord, for giving the Church such a man. We know you've greeted him warmly when he left his decaying body behind and joined You in glory. But now, for us yet here in the battle...could You please give us a few more like him?
