A New York native, Father Joseph Gartner was ordained in 1940 as a priest of the Brooklyn Diocese before making his first oath to Glenmary in 1951. He attended seminary in Brooklyn and Huntington, N.Y., and received a canon law degree from Catholic University in 1955.

In his years with Glenmary, he served as a teacher in Glenmary seminaries in Cincinnati and Connecticut. He also served missions in Alabama, Virginia, Georgia, North Carolina, Texas and Mississippi.

After receiving senior member status in 1981, he worked for the next 11 years for the Diocese of Covington, Ky., in the diocesan Marriage Tribunal. Today Father Joe, 87, is living in a retirement center in Cincinnati where he devotes himself to the ministry of prayer for the success of Glenmary’s work.