‘The church should be more like that’: Union Baptist’s journey toward beloved community
VALLEY FORCE, PA (07/17/2025)—Union Baptist Church in Mystic, Conn., one of American Baptist Home Mission Societies’ (ABHMS) many longtime supporters, looks like many small-town churches in New England. It is a beautiful, historic, white-steepled building; it also houses a congregation charting a bold course. Under the leadership of Rev. Dr. Lonnie Brown, Union Baptist has embraced a public theology of welcome and justice, becoming a spiritual home for those often pushed to the margins. The church is doing more than proclaiming openness: it’s practicing it. At a time when many churches are shrinking or disagreeing over social justice issues, Union Baptist is finding growth not in numbers, but in courage and clarity.
Union Baptist Church, Mystic, Connecticut, courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.
Union Baptist is very clear about being an American Baptist congregation. “The congregation shows many signs of what I would call ‘American Baptist pride,’” said Jennifer Sanborn, ABHMS’ national coordinator for learning initiatives, who was recently invited to preach at Union Baptist. “There’s a prominent bulletin board dedicated to American Baptist partners. The Secret Place devotionals were available near the bulletins, along with ‘We Are American Baptist’ pamphlets. A more recent member came up to me holding a copy of the Christian Citizen that she had found downstairs in the church.”
When Brown was called to serve at Union Baptist eight years ago, the church was struggling to articulate its mission. With a declining congregation, it was focused on its internal challenges. They felt too ambivalent about their ability to provide answers to reach out to the community. But that began to change; the murder of George Floyd in 2020 was a catalyst to spur them into action. As a majority white congregation, they began to confront their own whiteness and educate themselves on racial inequality.
These endeavors were intimately connected to the commitment to foster intergenerational leadership at the church. Jamal Davis Neal Jr.is a young leader who has changed things up at the church. Having recently earned a dual Master of Divinity and Master of Social Work degree from Yale Divinity School, he is both the embodiment and catalyst of Union Baptist’s commitments to intersectional justice and inclusive leadership. A lifelong member of the congregation, he is currently supported by the church in his ordination process through the ABC Connecticut region. He is deeply involved in the church’s growth around issues of inclusion and justice, especially in helping the congregation confront issues related to race and gender identity. A Black queer man, he describes the church as both his spiritual home and a site of mutual transformation as it evolves toward being a more inclusive and justice-oriented congregation.
In December 2020, Neal came out publicly to the congregation during a sermon. “It was really important for me, for my journey toward ordination, that they know and acknowledge that I am a queer person.” This moment of vulnerability and leadership helped catalyze the church’s journey from a general ethos of “all are welcome” toward becoming explicitly welcoming and affirming.
This sentiment was also expressed in an updated church covenant. “There was a group that had felt for years like our church covenant was kind of a musty, dusty old historical document that we needed to breathe new life into,” said Brown. In time, the church came to agree on the new wording, abandoning the vague phrase “all are welcome” in favor of a more specific covenant that reads, “We invite seekers, believers, questioners, and questioning believers to join us. We celebrate our diversity as persons of every age and size, color, culture or race, and physical and mental ability. We embrace singles and partners of every sexual orientation, gender identity, gender expression, and relationship commitment. We honor individuals of every economic status from every neighborhood or no neighborhood, as well as people with any differences, real or perceived.”
This true welcome encouraged another young lay leader, Anna, who is a mom and a trans spouse. “She grew up in this church, she graduated from high school and did as many of us do and hit a few years of struggle and searching,” says Brown. She currently manages the church nursery on Sunday mornings. “She says that she loves it because it’s a chance for her to be in there with her kids and other church members who are surrounding her kids with love, reading to them, whatever else, giving her a little bit of a break.” Anna and her family love the church because they thrive there as their full selves.
The church’s work was further galvanized in 2024 by the death of Nex Benedict, a non-binary teenager of Choctaw descent from Oklahoma, who died by suicide after being bullied at their school for more than a year. In grief over Benedict’s death, the church reached out to the members of the local LGBTQ community and organized a vigil. Brown recollected a huge turnout at the vigil that included even the more conservative church members. A 90-year-old congregation member volunteered to be the usher at the service and later commented, “the church should be more like that.”
The new covenant is read out every Communion Sunday.
This year, the church participated in its first community Pride festival and hosted its own Pride celebration. In addition to LGBTQ+ rights and racial justice, Union Baptist has become locally involved in initiatives such as homelessness prevention, improving food access, and local ecumenical partnerships. “[Our work] is not for us. It’s for the community, even those who don’t see themselves as part of the Body of Christ,” commented Brown.
Every month on Communion Sunday, the congregation collects funds for social justice issues through a second offering. Many of these collections are for ABHMS and ABCUSA initiatives, including America for Christ and One Great Hour of Sharing. You can join them in the mission to become the hands and feet of Christ by donating here.
By Rev. Dr. Anna Piela, senior writer for ABHMS and associate editor of The Christian Citizen
