Sponsler, John F.

1990, February 15

Date of Birth: 1920, August 10

John Francis Sponsler was born in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, on August 10, 1920. His father was a Lutheran, but John seems to have been influenced more by his mother, an Episcopalian. He studied at Carroll College in Waukesha, Wisconsin from 1940 to 1943. From there he advanced to Nashotah House Episcopal-Seminary from which he was ordained as an Episcopal minister in 1945. He served in several Pennsylvania Episcopal parishes for the next few years, On August 14, 1950, he was received into the Catholic Church at St, Ann’s in Steelton, Pennsylvania. He studied at St, Mary’s Seminary from 1951 to 1955, and was ordained in Harrisburg by Bishop George Leech on May 28, 1955. As a Sulpician candidate he was assigned to St. Thomas Seminary in Louisville, Kentucky; there he taught various subjects. The following year, 1956, he made his Solitude at Roland Park under Fathers Linn and McDonough. In 1957 he went back to Louisville and resumed teaching there until 1964 when he left the Society of St. Sulpice to return to the Diocese of Harrisburg. In his native diocese he served at several parishes and taught at Deleon High School in McSherrystown until 1970 when he withdrew from active service in the priesthood. ·He died as a Catholic in good standing on February 15, 1990.

Data supplied by Rev, John Bowen.