Obituaries, as printed in the June 14, 2020 issue of The Living Church.
The Rev. Stephen J. Chinlund, who devoted much of his life to prison reform and substance-abuse rehabilitation, died at his home in Manhattan on April 8, aged 86.
A native New Yorker, Chinlund graduated from Harvard College and then prepared for the ministry at General Seminary and Union Theological Seminary. He assisted in several Manhattan parishes following his ordination, while also studying social work at Columbia and NYU.
In 1966, he became assistant director of Exodus House, a program designed to help formerly incarcerated people transition to life in the community. He went on to found Reality House, a substance-abuse treatment center in New York, and he directed the Manhattan Rehabilitation Center from 1968-1973. He established a counseling program at the Taconic State Correctional Facility and a prisoner-family program for New York State’s Department of Corrections, developing a curriculum that is still widely used in the field. He also chaired a corrections commission which had oversight of treatment standards for prisoners throughout New York’s criminal-justice system.
Father Chinlund returned to parish ministry in 1982, serving for six years as rector of Trinity Church in Southport, Connecticut, and then became executive director of Episcopal Social Services in New York, a position he held until his retirement in 2005. In recent years, he became a devoted painter, wrote a play and a book about prison reform, and was involved in advocacy work.
He is survived by his wife, Caroline Cross Chinlund, two children, and six grandchildren.
The Very Rev. Gus Franklin, III, SSC, a bivocational priest who had a deep love of music, died May 3 after a long battle with lung cancer, aged 82.
A native of Bellevue, Kentucky, Father Franklin earned degrees in music, mathematics, and education before entering Nashotah House to prepare for the ministry. He was ordained in 1967, and began his ministry at Saint Paul’s Cathedral in Springfield, Illinois, serving in several roles there for 17 years. He then became rector of Christ the King, Normal, Illinois, and St. Andrew the Apostle in Peoria, and upon his retirement in 1998, was made dean emeritus of the Diocese of Quincy.
Father Franklin was also assistant professor of mathematics at Lincoln Land Community College and the University of Illinois in Springfield. He was active in the world of organ music, serving as president of the American Theater Organ Society and was a founder of the International Theater Organ Society. He was also active in the Springfield Choral Society for many years. He was a member of the Confraternity of the Blessed Sacrament and the Guild of All Souls.
The Rev. Deacon Joyce Hardy, a champion for social justice, died May 14, aged 69.
She was a native of Oklahoma, and a graduate of the University of Arkansas and Nebraska State University. She was ordained in the Diocese of Oklahoma in 1985, and served as chaplain of Holland Hall School in Tulsa until 1989, when she moved to Arkansas to serve as an assistant at St. Paul’s Church in Fayetteville. She later at served at several parishes and at Trinity Cathedral in Little Rock. She was archdeacon of the Diocese of Arkansas for several years and served on the staff of Little Rock’s St. Francis House, an Episcopal social ministry center. Deacon Hardy worked extensively for the Arkansas Death Penalty Moratorium Campaign and was a board member of the Episcopal Peace Fellowship.
The Rt. Rev. Larry Benfield, Bishop of Arkansas, paid tribute to her legacy, writing, “What I will remember most about Joyce is that she was the best advocate for the poor of almost anyone I have met. The very people whom society often tends to hide or forget about — well, they were the people who were first and foremost in Joyce’s life. Few people have lived more fully into the sort of life that Jesus held up when he said, ‘I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you welcomed me, I was naked and you gave me clothing, I was sick and you took care of me, I was in prison and you visited me.’”
Douglas LeBlanc is the Associate Editor for Book Reviews and writes about Christianity and culture. He and his wife, Monica, attend St. Matthew’s Episcopal Church in Henrico, Virginia.
