Meet Our Minister

Rev. Addae Ama Kraba

Unitarian Universalist Minister

After earning a Bachelor’s degree in Organizational Behavior from the University of San Francisco, a Masters from Starr King School for the Ministry in Berkeley, California, Rev. Kraba was ordained by Community Church of New York, Unitarian Universalist where she also served her internship. A deep interest in the divine feminine led to pursuit of a PhD in Women’s Spirituality at California Institute of Integral Studies in San Francisco. She continues online studies. Prior to ministry, Rev. Kraba spent over twenty years in the field of mental health that led to employment in Ohio, Pennsylvania, the Hawaiian Islands and California.

Rev. Addae (as she is fondly called) served as fulltime minister of First Universalist Church of Southold, in Long Island, New York, from 2006-2010. Her call was the first settled position with a minister of color in the congregation’s 150 year history. Practicing what she preaches her bridge building led to community service on the Southold Town’s Anti- Bias committee, Rotary Club International, and pulpit exchanges to deliver sermons in the town’s Methodist, Presbyterian, and Baptist churches. Rev. Addae was named one of  Suffolk Times News Review’s people of the year in 2007 for work on the Committee for Phil McKnight, a community collaborative that successfully raised over $10,000.00 for a local resident in crisis. Her sevice extends to the denomination as a member of DRUUM Diverse&Revolutonary Unitarian Universalist Multicultural Ministries, the Unitarian Universalist Minister Association’s Committee on Anti-Racism and Multiculturalism. A former Co-Convener of UU Women and Religion, she served on the planning committee of the First International Convocation of Unitarian Universalist Women (ICUUW) held in Houston, Texas 2008, and continues supporting women’s rights through the global network. Her personal theology of Universal love is in alignment with the historical figure Rev. John Murray’s “Give them not hell but hope” leading to serve as trustee for the Murray Grove Retreat and Conference Center.

Rev. Addae is adjunct faculty at Starr King School for the Ministry, having taught classes on Sacred Rest and Her story: African Goddesses. She has an Untitled poem published in Vol. II of She Is Everywhere: An anthology of writing in Womanist and Feminist Spirituality, under her former name, Addae Lee Watson. In the summer of 2008 travel to West Africa led to a name changing ceremony in Elmina Ghana, adding Ama Kraba to her Ghanaian name Addae. Ama Kraba was the name of a queen from Edina Essaman in Ghana, and the name was bestowed upon her by the late queen’s great grandson. Rev. Addae is the mother of five adult children, four sons and one daughter, and six grandchildren that live in various parts of the country. She resides in Philadelphia, PA. with animal companions King Solomon(Sol) and Queen Makeda (Meke) toy poodles.