Commissioner Reverend Thomas L. Bowen

Rev. Thomas L. Bowen serves as General Secretary of the Progressive National Baptist Convention, Inc., the historic civil rights denomination that was the denominational home of the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. He also serves as the Earl L. Harrison Minister of Social Justice at Shiloh Baptist Church of Washington, DC, where he has been a member of the ministerial team since 2002.

A longtime advocate at the intersection of faith, public policy, and social justice, Rev. Bowen previously served as Senior Advisor for Public Engagement at the White House, where he served as a liaison to the faith community and led outreach to faith leaders and organizations across the country.

Prior to joining the White House, he served in the Executive Office of Washington, DC Mayor Muriel Bowser, concurrently serving as Director of African American Strategic Engagement, Director of the Mayor’s Office on African American Affairs, and Director of the Mayor’s Office of Religious Affairs. During his eight years in the Bowser administration, he became affectionately known as “DC’s Pastor.”

Rev. Bowen’s career also includes service with the Children’s Defense Fund, a national child advocacy organization, and previous service on the Board of Trustees of the Public Defender Service for the District of Columbia. Religion News Service has described him as a “religious affairs expert.”

A native of Elyria, Ohio, Rev. Bowen is a graduate of Morehouse College, where he was a Ford Foundation Scholar and served as president of the college chapter of the NAACP. He also pursued graduate studies at the University of Chicago Divinity School. He has called Washington, DC home since 2001.

This page was last updated on Aguust 17, 2026.