Sanford Garner; D.C. Rector Worked for Peace Abroad

The Rev. Sanford Garner Jr., 82, a former rector of Christ Episcopal Church in Georgetown and later interim provost of Washington National Cathedral, died Sept. 30 of pancreatic cancer at his home in the District.

Rev. Garner -- "a model of how important a priest can be in the modern world," said Librarian of Congress James H. Billington -- served parishes in Tennessee and Wisconsin before coming to Christ Church in 1973. Issues of peace, justice and reconciliation, both in the United States and abroad, were a central focus of his life and ministry. He was a member of the Washington Diocese Commission on Peace and the diocese's Inter-Racial Task Force and Standing Committee.

In the 1970s, he helped establish House of Hope, a peace center in Galilee for Palestinian and Israeli young people, and was active in peace initiatives in Central America and Bosnia. In 1985, he and his wife co-founded the Washington Cooperation Circle, part of an interfaith global peace organization called United Religions Initiative. He also was one of the founders of Episcopal Caring Response to AIDS (ECRA) and of the Georgetown Senior Center.

He resigned as rector of Christ Church in 1990 and served as interim provost of National Cathedral until his retirement in 1992. He served as honorary chaplain to the British Embassy in Washington and in 1991 hosted Queen Elizabeth II and Prince Phillip during a visit to the cathedral.

She was refreshingly late, The Washington Post noted, although the Rev. Garner was unfazed. "She seemed very interested in the cathedral itself," he said, in what The Post described as "his soft Tennessee accent." In 1997, the queen commissioned him an Officer of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire.

The Rev. Garner was born in Henning, Tenn., and was a student at the University of Tennessee before joining the Army in 1943. He served as a combat infantry officer in the 6th Armored Division of the 3rd Army in Europe.

In the spring of 1945, he was assigned to Supreme Headquarters Allied Expeditionary Forces in London and Versailles and on July 3, 1945, was in the first contingent of U.S. troops to enter Berlin. He also served as aide-de-camp to Brig. Gen. Stuart Cutler in France and Belgium and aide-de-camp to Maj. Gen. John T. Lewis, commanding general of Western Base Section in Paris.

After the war, he returned to the University of Tennessee, from which he graduated in 1949. After considering both medical and law school, he enrolled in the School of Theology at the University of the South in Sewanee, Tenn., where he received a master of divinity degree in 1952. He also did postgraduate work at St. Augustine's College in Canterbury, England, and received a certificate in clinical pastoral training from Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston.

Survivors include his wife of 46 years, Mary Cox Garner of Washington; three sons, Sanford Garner III of Washington, James Allen Garner of Bozeman, Mont., and Robert Reiney Garner of San Francisco; and two grandchildren.