Nana Kwabena Brown
Nyama Healing Services was founded in 2000, by Nana Kwabena Brown, a respected healer and counselor. Nyama Healing Services (NHS) provides premarital and couples' counseling, rites of passage training and conducts relationship workshops amongst its offerings. We present excellent relationship workshops for singles, couples, adolescents and seniors. We also do workshops on parenting skills, along with understanding and managing separation, loss and grief issues.
​
​
​
African traditional spiritual priest, father, son, anthropologist, consultant, educator, instructor, trainer and coordinator, Nana Kwabena William Brown is a respected healer and counselor. He is the Chief Priest and Founder of the Temple of Nyame. Nana Kwabena’s studies of the religious and the spiritual have taken him from the esoteric to the metaphysical to the scholastic realms of knowledge.
Nana Kwabena Aboagye Brown had little choice in being what he is today. Born in the midst of a world changed by the Second World War, he was nurtured in a proud West Indian household that stressed a sense of culture and identity. From a mother whose strong guiding hand and smiling supportive face molded and shaped him, he grew into a young man in the 1950s and 60s who had a desire to explore the intricacies of culture and spirit that bonded people together. This natural-haired woman whom we know as Iyalode, not only gave him life, but also she gave him and others so much more. Through her, he got his jump-start that propelled him into a journey along the spiritual path that has taken him all over the world. Through his mother and her mother, he gained a sense of what is right, what is decent, and what is culture.
The myth that had been propagated by white racist anthropologists and sociologists that people of color had no culture to speak of fell on deaf ears in their household. Nana’s grandfather, a Garveyite, would never allow their offspring to fall victim to the racial trap of inferiority. Preaching the doctrine of “Africa for the Africans,” this West Indian family personified the positive attributes of Garveyism. They sunk their roots deep into the earth of racial identity and culture pride. Migrating from New York to Washington, DC, the family brought this cultural awareness and desire to educate their people to Eighth Street Southeast to Zaro’s House of Africa. This mecca of African art and artifacts became one of the focal points of the establishment of the Akan religion in the Washington Metropolitan area. Their vision was further fueled by Nana’s mother, who introduced Nana Kwabena to Nana Yao Opare Dinizulu, who was one of the chief architects for the introduction of African culture to the United States. It was this association that helped Nana shape the foundation of his beliefs for the development of study groups and then the African Cultural and Religious Society.
​
His teachers have been many and varied. In his quest to introduce people to a spiritual path, he has studied under a variety of masters.
They include:
Ayetei Tettey, a Bukor who taught him the ethical nature of spiritual work; Okyeame Kojo Donkoh, who first introduced him to Nana Akua Oparebea, Chief Medium/Okomfo of the tutelar spirit of the Eastern Region of Ghana, West Africa Nana Akonedi., who taught him about divination, working with the spirits and with the various shrines in Ghana, and still continues to teach him from the spiritual. Dr. John Eubanks, of the Howard University School of Divinity, an outstanding scholar who helped Nana to further develop into a scholarly and spiritual person. Professor Rena Karifa-Smart of Howard University, showed Nana the essence of religion as a tool for social change. Dr. Leon Wright gave Nana Kwabena the metaphysical understanding of applied spirituality. Nana Kofi Donkoh from Techiman, Ghana, gave him the knowledge of herbs and medicines for spiritual work. Kofi Ifa, son of Kofi Donkoh, provided Nana with a greater understanding of the skills and techniques of spiritual healing. Also, Perizade Inyat Khan, a Sufi mystic, with whom Nana beginning at the age of twenty-one spent two wonderful summers, taught Nana Kwabena meditation techniques and concepts of spiritual growth and development.
As the Chief priest and founder of the Temple of Nyame and of Nyama Healing Services, Nana Kwabena Aboagye Brown has been a tireless servant to the people. He continues to provide counseling, Rites of Passage training, and consultations on African religions and cultural practices. He continues to be a committed, compassionate, passionate and emotional servant of the people.
​
As a result of his studies, Nana Kwabena has attained two Master's degrees, and is also an ordained traditional African priest and licensed minister. He is a traditional healer in the Guan-Akan and Ewe traditions of Ghana, West Africa. He is a former seminarian with a Master of Arts Degree in Religious Studies from the Howard University School of Divinity, a Master's degree in Community Education, and is presently a candidate for a Master of Arts degree in Counseling, at the University of the District of Columbia. He has a strong background in anthropology and sociology, and has taught the latter on the college level. He has a solid clinical background and training with over nineteen years of experience working in clinical settings. He has done graduate work in group counseling techniques. Nana Kwabena's services consist of a wonderful mix of traditional holistic practices from African and Native American traditions, with modern and established clinical practices.
Nana Kwabena has experience and training as a relationship counselor; functional family therapist, parenting skills trainer; men's growth and development workshop facilitator; rites of passage coordinator; family enhancement specialist; community support worker; substance abuse educator; prevention counselor; team-building consultant; as well as premarital and couples counselor. He has conducted workshops for hundreds of individuals as well as various organizations, businesses, practices, and religious bodies.
​
Nana Kwabena brings an amazing mix of a strong clinical background with years of experience as fully initiated traditional priest and healer, which delivers life-changing results.
​
Nana Kwabena is a registered and licensed clergy in the District of Columbia with reciprocity in other cities.
​
​Nana Kwabena is available to officiate all the rituals of life transitions/Rites of Passage stages:​
-
Naming Ceremonies
-
Adolescent Rites of Initiation & Transitions
-
Weddings & Marriages
-
Home-going Services/Funerals