As the second editor of The Presbyterian Outlook, Aubrey N. Brown, Jr., exercised pivotal influence in shaping the Presbyterian Church in the U.S. (PCUS) and in promoting its reunion with the other denominations known by the various acronyms UPCNA, PCUSA and UPCUSA.
Aubrey grew up in west Texas, attended Davidson College (N.C.) and, after graduation, earned the Bachelor of Divinity at Union Seminary in Virginia. He served two pastorates in West Virginia and in 1943 moved to Richmond, Va., to join his former seminary professor, Ernest Trice Thompson, in leading the magazine.
In a 1967 Christmas card to his former student, Thompson wrote, “There is nothing in my ecclesiastical career that I look back upon with more satisfaction than my part in persuading you to serve the Church through what is now The Presbyterian Outlook.”
At the time of his arrival, the magazine was called Presbyterian of the South, but the two editors changed it to The Presbyterian Outlook, to highlight its image as a progressive church voice.
Through his 35-year tenure, Brown provided careful reporting of the news of the church, which would reach extreme proportions when he would single-handedly report on the annual General Assembly meetings of both the PCUS and the UPCUSA.
He promoted causes such as racial justice, the ordination of women, and ecumenical reconciliation. He also challenged what he perceived to be a narrow form of biblicism in the church.
The magazine was and remains the only surviving, national, independent, weekly magazine serving a denomination in the U.S.A. In a 1997 interview with the Richmond Times-Dispatch, he said, “The Outlook has something of the watchman idea in it, and it was needed. The church’s bureaucracy was committed to keeping the lid on things, the curtains drawn. …
“It was a long and constant struggle to get them opened up as they are today, though there are some agencies, bureaucrats, and institutions that try to keep the doors closed and let the church know [what happened] only after crucial actions are taken.”
Reflecting back upon early impressions of Brown and Thompson, Biblical scholar James L. Mays reflected, “I thought of them as liberal. … They were seen in their context as revolutionary. But, they were morally conservative and theologically orthodox.” He added, “They saw all the things they were for as logical implications of their Reformed theology.”
In addition to publishing the magazine, Brown provided hands-on leadership to such causes. He served as the first president of the Richmond chapter of the Virginia Council on Human Relations and later as president of the statewide organization. He chaired the Virginia Advisory Committee to the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights, and served the World Alliance of Presbyterian and Reformed Churches from 1962 until 1973. He also carried on extensive correspondence with leaders around the church and nation to promote reform.
Subsequent Outlook editor, Robert Bullock says, “Aubrey was a tremendous journalist, theologian, street-fighter. He went head-to-head with the reactionary forces in the southern Presbyterian Church.”
Mays adds, “I never heard either [Brown or Thompson] attack the people who were attacking them.”
In a tribute published after Brown’s death, historian James H. Smylie, commented, “Aubrey had his own strong convictions to be sure, but he believed in printing all the news and views fit to print about what was going on in the church and world. He reported the controversies and often took sides; he printed letters to the editor and published mini-biographies of lay persons and ministers who were making a difference.”
He also was a local churchman in Richmond, serving as interim pastor of the [predominantly African-American] All Souls Church and teaching adult education at the Ginter Park Church, which continues to meet weekly as the “Peace Forum” class.
This inheritor of Aubrey’s office of Outlook editor squirms whenever contemplating the skillful stewardship of this office that was exercised by this predecessor. If I can be just one-tenth as effective in my tenure here as Aubrey Brown, Jr., was in his, the church will be enriched again.
— JHH
