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Welcome to Thinking Out Loud, a blog that contains postings from The Tampa Tribune’s Editorial Board and from various Tribune Community Columnists. Unlike the unsigned editorials that represent the newspaper’s institutional voice, the blog postings offer personal perspectives on the issues, personalities and events of Tampa Bay. We invite you to participate by posting your comments. We’ll do our best to respond.

Contributors:

Joe Guidry

Joe Guidry is the deputy editorial page editor of The Tampa Tribune. He is a Tampa native and a graduate of the University of South Florida. He is married and has an adult son.

Jeff Stidham

Jeff Stidham grew up and lives in Bartow. He has been with the Tribune for nearly 22 years, the last 10 on the editorial board.

William Yelverton

William Yelverton is a Tribune editorial writer who has worked for the paper nearly 22 years. He lives in the Dade City area.

Jim Beamguard

Jim Beamguard is a Tribune editorial writer. He is a native of North Carolina and a graduate of Davidson College. He and his family live in Brandon.

Jackie Papandrew:

Jackie Papandrew is a freelance writer and editor. Her syndicated humor column appears in publications in the United States, Canada and India. She lives in Largo with her husband and children. Visit her website at www.jackiepapandrew.com.

Camille Beredjick

Camille Beredjick is a senior at Chamberlain High School, an avid musician and a scribbler with a quirky sense of humor. In the fall, she will be attending Northwestern University to study journalism, political science and music, and she plans to pursue a career in journalism.

Jim Harnish

Jim Harnish is in his 17th year as Senior Pastor at Hyde Park United Methodist Church in Tampa. He and his wife, Marsha, have two daughters and two grandchildren. He is a graduate of Asbury Theological Seminary and received the honorary Doctor of Divinity degree from Bethune-Cookman University. He is the author of six books and numerous articles and studies. He enjoys playing with his grandchildren and cheering for the Florida Gators.

Angela Hunt

Angela Hunt is a novelist living in Pinellas County with her husband and two 220-pound mastiffs.

Sheryl Young

Sheryl Young was a Tampa Tribune Community Columnist in 2005-2006. A freelance writer since 1997, including the Tampa Bay Business Journal, Tampa Style Magazines, St. Pete Times and nationally in Better Nutrition, Today’s Christian Woman and more. She’s received a First Place Amy Foundation national "Roaring Lambs" Writing Award, and has lived in Tampa Bay with her family for over 20 years.

Christie Gold

Christie Gold teaches English and journalism at Freedom High School in Tampa where she advises Revolution, the school newspaper. She has been both the Hillsborough County Teacher of the Year and Florida Journalism Teacher of the Year. She lives on a small farm in Wesley Chapel where she trains as a competitive equestrian.

Natalie D. Preston

Natalie D. Preston is a karaoke singing, only-child pouting, Seminole Tomahawk waving, newlywed bride blushing, 50-state traveling, girlie girl who loves to shop, read, run and jump up and down on her soapbox.

Fernando Figueroa

Fernando Figueroa is a researcher, educator and lives in Riverview.

Gary Beemer

Interests include humor, politics, economics, community and world affairs, finance, people, religion, music, sports, current events, the arts and education.

Nicole Yunger Halpern

Nicole Yunger Halpern is an undergraduate at Dartmouth College, where she studies everything she can get her nerdy little hands on. Desired major: life. No, not necessarily biology. Life.

Kris DiGiovanni

Kris DiGiovanni is a Tribune Community Columnist, Huffington Post contributor, Daily Kos diarist, and teacher, who recently moved from NW Hillsborough to another planet - a small beach community in Pinellas County. She also blogs at www.sandscript.wordpress.com

H. David Braswell Jr.

H. David Braswell Jr. is an Information Systems Professional. He is a native New Yorker and a lifelong NY Giants fan. He attended college in California (Cal State Northridge) and moved to Tampa in 1998.

Sean Marcus

Sean Marcus teaches creative writing, journalism and reading at Chamberlain High School. He has one son and is expecting a daughter in early March. He can be reached at wuizabug@gmail.com

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On the Passing of Pastor Abe Brown - A Local Spiritual Hero

Posted Sep 16, 2010 by Sheryl Young

Updated Sep 16, 2010 at 08:37 AM

On September 11, Tampa lost a spiritual leader and guardian of the true Christian spirit of love. Pastor Abe Brown passed away at the age of 83.

Why hasn’t the world outside of Tampa Bay heard of Abe Brown?

Pastor Brown was the kind of Christian minister most people don’t hear about. He wasn’t a Terry Jones (the one who wanted to burn the Koran) or Fred Phelps (the gay-hating “pastor”). Kind and gentle, humble and loving, Brown would never be found in media reports for making sensational, outrageous statements about other faiths or people engaged in behavior that he felt God wouldn’t approve. He spoke the truth as he knew it from God’s word with sensitivity and understanding.

He just loved people. And people loved him. He reached beyond the boundaries of religion on a one-on-one basis as well as touching Tampa’s citizenry in general with his concern and leadership as a mentor, businessman and encourager.

As has been stated in a tbo.com farewell (thanks for this, Tribune Staff), Brown attended college on a football scholarship and became a teacher and coach himself. With a tender spot to see that boys would grow up safely and learn how to be respectable men, he began mentoring youth. He founded Abe Brown Ministries (originally called Prison Ministries) in the mid-1970s and it is still going strong today.

Later in life, he became pastor of the First Baptist Church of College Hill (early 1990s through 2007). College Hill is one of the most dangerous, criminally prone neighborhoods in Tampa. Brown, an African American, worked hard to make the church a valuable sanctuary and resource in that area for all races. While also helping prisoners and their families, he never failed to attend to his other parishioners, other charitable organizations, and the entire Tampa community.

I met Pastor Brown during my years as an Executive Assistant for my own (former) church. Being an insider to the goings on of an entire association of churches that participated in both religiously-oriented and general events in Tampa, I can say without a doubt that there was no “dirt” to be found on Pastor Abe Brown.

The epitome of love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control (Galatians 5:22-23), Pastor Abe Brown’s life is celebrated and his death mourned from officials in Tampa’s government to the man in the street.

You don’t hear about most Christian clergy like Abe Brown in the “mainstream” worldwide media because kindness and goodness don’t usually make sensational headlines.

Heaven is blessed to have him now.

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