To the Rev. Richard Turk, church wasn’t contained within the four walls of a sanctuary.
He ministered to prisoners throughout North Florida, served on a board that prepares ex-offenders to re-enter the workforce, helped build homes for the needy, collected presents for underprivileged children, served parishioners at St. Andrew’s Episcopal Church and taught college courses.
The former Catholic priest also was involved in an unlikely love story with a former Catholic nun that endured to his death Christmas morning. The Rev. Turk was 72 and died from complications of a heart condition.
“He had a servant’s heart, especially for the poor, the forgotten and the disenfranchised,” said Frank Cerveny, retired bishop of Florida. “He will be greatly missed because he was greatly loved.”
He met his wife, Davette Turk, in 1973, and they worked together in social justice ministry in the Roman Catholic Diocese of Trenton, N.J. The couple, who married in 1975, left Catholicism for the Episcopal church, where his ordination was accepted. In 1985, she became the first female Episcopal priest ordained in the state and became noted for her interfaith and race relations work.
Davette Turk, now retired, described her husband as a loving person who told the truth, taught the truth and lived the truth.
The couple came to Jacksonville in 1980 when Cerveny asked the Rev. Turk to join his staff as a minister in the state and federal prison system in North Florida. When they were very young, their children even thought prison was church, Davette Turk said.
In 1986, he became rector of St. Andrew’s in Arlington. He also was dean of the Anglican Institute of Studies, which he helped develop. He retired from St. Andrew’s in 2005 and became an adjunct religion professor at Florida State College at Jacksonville, where he served until his death.
“He was a big man [6-foot-6] with a big heart,” Cerveny said. “He was involved in any kind of ministry where he could share his gifts and talents.”
He spent eight years on the board of Operation New Hope, which helps former prisoners. Founder Kevin Gay said Turk was a second father and a mentor. The Rev. Turk also served on the HabiJax board and as a volunteer at The Sanctuary and the Triumph Church.
Friends describe his sense of humor, hearty laugh, passion for the Jaguars, adept guitar playing and love of sending jokes on the computer.
The Perth Amboy, N.J., native was born in 1939. He received his bachelor’s from St. Mary’s Seminary University in Baltimore, Md., in 1963; his master’s in theology from Princeton Theological Seminary in 1972; and his doctorate from Columbia Theological Seminary in Decatur, Ga., in 2002. He was ordained a Roman Catholic priest in New Jersey in 1967.
Survivors also include a son, Richard Ryan Turk; a daughter, Sara Melissa Beasley; and four grandchildren, all of Jacksonville.
Services are scheduled for 11 a.m. Saturday, Jan. 7, at Episcopal Church of the Redeemer, 7500 Southside Blvd.
sandy.strickland@jacksonville.com, (904) 359-4128