Father John B. “Jack” Warner, SJ, died Oct. 4 in Florissant. He is remembered for his highly successful ministry in El Progreso, Yoro, Honduras, where he founded and directed a theater company that became a beacon of cultural resistance and social evangelization, forming generations of artists committed to truth, memory and the transformation of their reality. He was 80 years old, a Jesuit for 63 years and a priest for 51 years.
His life will be celebrated during a Mass of Christian Burial at 10 a.m. Saturday, Oct. 18, in the chapel of St. Ignatius Hall, the Jesuit Community at Garden Villas North, in Florissant. A reception and celebration of his life and legacy will be held after the burial from 1-4 p.m. at St. Louis University High School, 4970 Oakland Ave in St. Louis.
Jack Warner was born Oct. 18, 1944, in Portsmouth, Virginia, to Claire (née Stanley) and John B. Warner Jr. He graduated from St. Louis University High School. He earned a bachelor’s degree in philosophy and completed his theology studies at Saint Louis University.
He entered the Society of Jesus (the Jesuits) at St. Stanislaus Seminary in Florissant on Aug. 21, 1962, and pronounced first vows two years later. He was ordained a priest on May 11, 1974, at St. Francis Xavier (College) Church in St. Louis. He professed his final vows in El Progreso in 1986.
As a Jesuit scholastic, Father Warner taught English for two years at St. Louis University High School where he started a Glee Club and directed numerous plays.
Following his ordination, he spent a year studying theology and honing his Spanish skills in Cochabamba, Bolivia. He then earned a master’s degree in directing from the Goodman School of Drama in Chicago. All of this prepared him for establishing Teatro La Fragua (Theater of the Forge or The Forge Theater) in 1979 at the age of 34. He said later of the name of his project, “I like the image … taking ideas and cultural realities and forming them into a shape that can be seen, heard and experienced; the forming of people and forming of ideas, and by doing so, giving people a reflection, an image of who they are and their own reality.”
The theater’s mission is to stimulate the creativity needed for problem solving and to enable Hondurans to show themselves and the world their culture’s worth, beauty and power even as globalization ranks some as inferior. Teatro La Fragua stands as a light on the cultural map of Latin America, a community where art and spirituality coexist, and where theater retains its power to unite, heal and inspire hope. La Fragua – true to Father Warner’s vision – reminds us that theater can be a way of serving others, of giving voice to the voiceless and of celebrating human dignity.
Father Warner continued to lead Teatro La Fragua until poor health dictated his return to the province in 2021.
In addition to his parents, he was preceded in death by his stepmother Kathlene “Kate” Rasmussen Warner, his sister Mary Katharine Whitt (George), and his sister-in-law Kathleen Brady Corcoran. He is survived by sisters Mary Margaret “Peggy” Facer (Thomas), Mary Patricia “Pat” Warner (Mary Anne) and Marie Elizabeth “Betsy” Warner, and brothers Michael O’Reilly “Mike” Warner (Amy) and Edward Kinsella “Ted” Warner (Mary), 12 nieces and nephews, 15 great-nieces and great-nephews and a myriad of cousins. He was also an honorary father, grandfather and great-grandfather to the numerous Honduran families who had adopted him as their own.
Burial will be at Calvary Cemetery.
