Those musical sounds coming from the sanctuary on Sunday mornings are the direct result of Divine Order. Mark Bryan joined us on August 6, 2000 to become our new Music Director of Unity Center. What a joy - both the music and the person.

Mark was born in Washington state and moved to Oklahoma when he was 16, having lived in Stillwater and Muskogee prior to Tulsa. What is so amazing about this talented guy is that he has never had a music lesson in his life. He is self-taught on both the piano and guitar. He discovered his gift for music when he got a little mini piano/organ at the age of 4 for his birthday. He sat down immediately and amazed his family by playing Silent Night and other Christmas carols he had recently heard during the holidays.

Mark writes music too; in fact he prefers to write his own compositions. During the last seven years he has had his own recording studio in his home. Mark has been married for ten years to Audrey, whom he laughingly says, "talked him into that marriage deal."

He says he is surprised to be playing in a church. He has written a great number of spirituals, but feels he is very unchurched. He is also surprised to have found Unity, which seems to fit closely with his own beliefs. He defines his spiritual life as honest - given to times of great turbulence and times of rich joy. He parallels his life with God to the action of a volcano erupting at times but then fertilizing the earth. In his honest, straightforward way, he says that the most important thing in any of our spiritual lives is to always go to God, and that means even if we are angry. He himself goes to God in periods of intense anger and also in periods of intense thankfulness. He is always ready to admit he is wrong and to change his beliefs when Spirit prompts him.  Here is a recent conversation with Rev. Ann Marie Davis on his thoughts and beliefs in his everyday life:

Conversation with Mark Bryan and Ann Marie

(Ann Marie) "Mark, your music brings such insight and inspiration to our Sunday service. Please share with us some of your own thoughts on spirituality and your personal process of evolving spiritually."
(Mark) "I say it best in my song, Beautiful You, Beautiful Me. I am beautiful because I am Born of infinite possibility, given to me by the unformed, unknown, that I am and in which I have my being.  Beautiful… I am an individuation of the whole mind, am inseparable from the very fabric of existence.  Every sentient being is that important, that deep, that complete."

 

(Ann Marie) "How do you make those beliefs practical in your life?"
(Mark) "Through loving …. Love is knowing in action, that there is no place that I can be that is outside of goodness."

 

(Ann Marie) "How does this help you trust that your needs will be met?"
(Mark) "I have no need except that which I imagine.  This imagining in all its many forms is my desire to know and be known."

 

(Ann Marie) "How does this affect your day to day life?"
(Mark) "The life that I am can only be experienced through relationships.  This co-mingling of individuation's of God can be felt with a deep understanding that everything is my infinite self, being alive as Me."

 

(Ann Marie) "How does Divine Presence play out in your life?"
(Mark) "This is peace.  The supernal mother of all things is ever finding her self.  I am that motion.  I have been coming together from before the dawn of creation.  From time and space, to the chemistry that makes me, from the smallest particle of life to my human family, to lives beyond my knowing, I have come to be here. My Joy is that of an endless being, expressing in endless ways."
     
 

Mark currently plays at the Celebrity Club on Friday and Saturday nights from 7:00 until 10:30 p.m. You might want join him there. And we are SURE you will want to join him on Sundays at Unity Center.