The Rev. Curtis L. Keith Jr., interim minister of Southwood Memorial Christian Church, has received the Distinguished Minister Award for pastoral ministry from Brite Divinity School at Texas Christian University.
Keith earned a Bachelor of Arts in 1961 from TCU and the Master of Divinity from Brite in 1963. He was ordained that year and returned to Brite to complete his Master of Theology in 1968 and his Doctor of Ministry in 1978.
He has been in fulltime ministry for more than 37 years, serving six churches in Texas and Arizona until his retirement in 2000. For the last 12 years, he has been a transitional minister in 10 congregations.
He became interim at Southwood in December and collaborates with Associate Pastor/Youth Pastor Ryan Vernon on the three services — traditional and contemporary — the church offers each Sunday.
Born in Houston and reared in Corpus Christi, the Texas native is married to his teenage sweetheart, Barbara, and they have four adult children. He loves the great outdoors, and he and Barbara spend as much time as they can in the mountains of the West. He has had a lifelong passion for faith, family, friends, food and fly fishing.