A positive force for LGBT Catholics, Father George Wertin will be remembered.
Father George Wertin pastored St. Joan of Arc in Minneapolis from 1992 to 2005, and helped transform it into a LGBT-friendly parish.
On its website, the St. Joan of Arc comunity wrote: He heartily supported our mission as a peace community in a time of war, and actively welcomed our gay and lesbian community during an especially difficult time in our church. George Wertin, the SJA community thanks you for your gifts as priest, leader and friend. May you rest in peace and the company of angels.”
He died on August 28.
Wertin pastored St. Joan of Arc during a tumultuous time. The parish continued to move in an accpeting direction for LGBT members, yet a conservative group called Catholic Parents Online frequently targeted the parish and Wertin.
In April 2003, Wertin and St. Joan of Arc’s invited Mel White of Soulforce to speak from the pulpit, but Archbishop Harry Flynn blocked the church from hosting White after pressure from Catholic Parents Online.
“We’re very disappointed we can’t have Mel speak,” Wertin told the Star Tribune. “I respect him very much. He was not going to say anything contradictory to church teaching.”
“It was totally unexpected,” Wertin told the Pioneer Press. “Archbishop Flynn indicated that he had been informed that Mel White held a philosophy contrary to the Catholic Church on human sexuality. Even though I disagreed, I felt I had to respect the decision of the archbishop.”
In May of that year, a member of the St. Joan’s community was to be honored by the Archdiocese for her charity work, but Catholic Parents online struck again. Kathy Itzin was an openly lesbian employee at St. Joan’s. The conservatives complained to Archbishop Flynn who rescinded the award. Wertin was outspoken about Flynn’s decision, according to the Star Tribune:
Earlier, the Rev. George Wertin, pastor of St. Joan’s, said he “disagreed totally” with Flynn’s decision. “Kathy is a wonderful, respected member of our parish community and our staff,” he said. “The award recognized these outstanding qualities in her. To withdraw it simply because of her sexual orientation is offensive to all gays and lesbians and to all of us in her community.”
Wertin said both incidents show that “St. Joan’s is certainly being hit.” He added, “It seems” that Catholic Parents Online is “focusing on any parishes that are inclusive and supportive in any way of gay and lesbian communities.”
Wertin told the Pioneer Press: “I just respect Kathy for who she is,” said the Rev. George Wertin of St. Joan’s. “She has done a wonderful job developing ministry for people and has done some remarkable things.”
By 2004, the pro-LGBT stance of St. Joan of Arc’s had made its way to the Vatican. The Archdiocese of St. Paul and Vatican officials ordered the church to remove LGBT-supportive materials from its website and stop allowing LGBT folks to speak during mass. St. Joan’s and Wertin reluctantly complied.
In a letter to the St. Joan’s community, he wrote:
“We have to determine the best way to allow the Web site to represent St. Joan of Arc and the positions of the Church and also allow for open dialogue and discussion within our community. It does become a problem when outsiders who know little or nothing about our community and its content log on and interpret what we are about without a full context. We are, however, committed to openness and transparency. We have nothing to hide…We also need to find creative and healthy ways to be a prophetic community that is creative and also humble… We cannot allow ourselves to be viewed as self-righteous and intolerant. We need to explore new ways of relating with the archbishop and the larger church.”
After the representatives from the Archdiocese (under orders from the Vatican) left the church, Wertin told the Star Tribune:
“I really think this is part of a much larger struggle,” the Rev. George Wertin, the pastor at St. Joan’s, told the gay and lesbian parishioners at last month’s meeting. He then referred to the civil rights movement of the 1950s and 1960s that helped overturn discriminatory laws. “What happened for black people has to happen now for a new group of people.”
Wertin retired on July 1, 2005. “This is a very difficult decision for me,” Wertin told the Star Tribune. “Despite the challenges and controversies – and in part because of them – I have found my ministry among you wonderful parishioners to be fulfilling.”
In a Q & A shortly before he retired, Wertin told the Star Tribune about hsi favorite parts of the Bible:
It’s the Sermon on the Mount, Matthew chapters 5, 6, and 7, which are where we find the very powerful passages about what it means to be a follower of Jesus, everything from the Beatitudes to being the salt of the earth, the light of the world. And then I like very much that passage from Galatians 3:27 [that] all of us who are baptized are baptized into Christ Jesus, in Christ Jesus there is no longer anyone who’s Jew or Greek, slave or free, woman or man, all are one in Christ Jesus. That sense of equality that is key to what’s needed in the world today. When you look at just the hatreds of people for each other and the resentment for gays and lesbians, and all of the rest of it, you see that until we get that lesson down, why, Christianity has not done its work.
Wertin’s legacy at St. Joan’s parish lives on. The June newsletter reads: June 2014: “A Prayer Service for Our GLBT Community: On Wednesday, June 25 at 7 pm in the Church, we invite you to join this service of thanksgiving for the presence of our gay and lesbian community and the gifts they share with our parish. A great celebration – join us!”
A celebration of Wertin’s life will be held at the St. Joan of Arc gym on Friday, Sept. 5 with visitation at 4pm, program at 4:30pm, mass at 5pm, and then a reception.