TRUCK FIRE – Firefighters knock down a fire in a Ford Explorer truck in Arrowhead Trailer Park in the 1200 block of Sawmill Creek Road Saturday evening. One person received fire-related injuries and was taken to the hospital, Sitka Fire Department Chief Craig Warren said, and the truck was considered a total loss. The cause of the fire is under investigation, Warren said. The fire hall received the call about the fire at 5:33 p.m., and one fire engine with eight firefighters and an ambulance were dispatched, he said. (Sentinel Photo by James Poulson)

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'Retired' Priest Marks 50 Years of Service

By ABIGAIL BLISS
Sentinel Staff Writer

As the Rev. Peter Gorges approaches the milestone of 50 years of priesthood, he maintains the same spirit that he had when he began.

Rev. Peter Gorges (Sentinel Photo)

His journey from a Bronx childhood to a priesthood in Alaska was led by Gorges’ tendency to see a need and fill it, enabled by his faith.

“If the Lord wants me to be some place, he’ll get me there, even if it’s in Alaska,” Gorges said, chuckling.

He will celebrate the 50th anniversary of his ordination on Tuesday, May 29, with a Mass at St. Gregory’s and a reception to follow. There will be additional celebrations of the milestone in Juneau, at St. Paul’s Catholic Church on July 7, and at the cathedral there on July 8.

Gorges was ordained by Cardinal Cushing at Holy Cross Cathedral in Boston on May 29, 1968, and spent most of his priesthood with the Diocese of Juneau. For the past half century, he has ministered in cities, villages, and logging camps throughout Alaska, including a notable stint as the first pastor of St. Paul the Apostle in Juneau.

In 1999, Gorges told the Sentinel, he came to Sitka as the pastor for St. Gregory Nazianzen Catholic Church.

He officially retired in 2001, but has continued to serve as a fill-in priest for Alaskan Catholic churches, filling needs throughout the state.

“The norm is for people to retire and go south,” he said. “But I said, ‘Gee, they need help here, and I like it here,’ so I’ve been filling in all over the state, most in Southeast Alaska.”

 

Path to Priesthood

Gorges said that his path to priesthood was a winding one, and not immediately apparent.

He grew up in a Catholic family in the Bronx, where he graduated from Cardinal Hayes High School in 1953. He said that he was “not at all” interested in entering the priesthood at that time, and most students viewed presentations on the matter as an excuse to miss class.

“At the Catholic high school,  they kept bringing in people to talk about religious order here and religious order there,” he said. “As far as most of us were concerned, it was time in the assembly hall... It was an unspoken thing among the students that you ask questions, you made it last as long as possible.”.

Gorges went on to study business administration at Manhattan College and work as a junior auditor at the Bowery Savings Bank in Manhattan.

It wasn’t until he was drafted into the U.S. Army in 1959, and assigned to Anchorage as an army chaplain’s assistant, that he began to think about becoming a priest himself.

“Here’s this guy, doing all this stuff, and he just didn’t have time to offer,” Gorges said of the chaplain he was serving. “And the people loved him. I said, ‘You need help?’”

After his commitment to the Army ended, Gorges returned to his work at the bank in Manhattan, and then began studying for seminary in September of 1961.

He took requisite preparatory courses in Greek and Latin in Haverhill, Massachusetts, and then attended St. John’s Seminary in Brighton, Massachusetts, from 1962 through 1968.

He returned to Juneau shortly after his ordination in May of that same year. Just as that first stint in Anchorage sparked his interest in becoming a priest, it introduced him to Alaska, which he was set on making his home.

“They sent for me all the way from Anchorage, Alaska,” he recalled of the first time he set foot in the state. “I’m from the Bronx. What did I know about Alaska? I got out of the airplane, and everything is green. It was June. I said, ‘I was expecting snow. Are you sure I’m in the right place?’”

Gorges said the role of a priest in Alaska is different from that in the Lower 48, noting that the small number of priests throughout the state makes for a close-knit group.

“The Alaska priesthood’s just not the same as outside,” he said. “Outside, they got their hands full. They’re running 24/7 with weddings and funerals and problems and doing services and Masses and all that. Here in Alaska, it’s a much different priesthood... The bishops and the priests are friends. In those places, the bishop doesn’t even know your name unless you’re in trouble, or unless you’re doing something very special.”

He said that his early studies in economics and accounting have, perhaps surprisingly, served him well during his time with the church.

“When I became a pastor, I knew exactly what the accounting business was all about, the bookkeeping business, and I could do it,” he said. “It’s been very handy. I’m very comfortable with numbers.”

 

Sage Advice

As he looked back on the past 50 years, Gorges had some words of wisdom to offer the next generation of priests: when you arrive at a parish, he advised, say that it’s nice to be home, and “don’t change anything for at least a year until you find out why it’s the way it is.”

“Be yourself,” he said. “If you love the people, the people will love you.”

Gorges said everyone, regardless of the degree of their involvement with the church, is called to be the best version of themselves. He appreciated, he said, a recent statement from Pope Francis on the subject.

“Everybody’s called to be a saint,” Gorges said, paraphrasing the pope’s sentiments. “You don’t have to be a nun. You don’t have be a priest or a bishop or somebody who’s in the news all the time. You have to be the best mother you can be. You have to be the best shopkeeper you can be. You have to be the best student you can be.... No, we’re not going to get our names in the newspaper, or even the church bulletin, but, you know, everybody’s supposed to be a saint where you are. Bloom where you’re planted.”

 

 

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20 YEARS AGO

March 2004

Businesses using the Centennial Hall parking lot testified Tuesday against a proposal to charge them rent in addition to the $200 annual permit fee. City Administrator Hugh Bevan made the proposal in response to the Assembly’s direction to Centennial Hall manager Don Kluting to try to close the $340,000 gap between building revenues and operational costs.


50 YEARS AGO

March 1974

Alaska Native Brotherhood Grand President William S. Paul Sr. will be special guest and speaker at the local ANB, Alaska Native Sisterhood Founders Day program Monday at the ANB Hall.

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