The Reverend Peter J. Gomes Dies at 68

Memorial Church leader felled by heart ailments, stroke

Reverend Peter J. Gomes

On March 10, the University announced that a memorial service celebrating the life and ministry of Reverend Gomes will be held in Memorial Church on April 6 at 11 a.m. All are welcome to attend. The service will also be broadcast live on WHRB (95.3 FM), which provides live Internet streaming.



 

The service will be broadcast live on Harvard’s radio station, WHRB 95.3 FM. For those outside the Cambridge area, WHRB provides live Internetstreaming.

The Reverend Peter J. Gomes, Plummer professor of Christian morals and Pusey minister in the Memorial Church, died Monday evening at age 68. As reported, he had suffered a heart attack and stroke last December 10 (he had had a pacemaker implanted in 2009), and was in a rehabilitation hospital.

Read the  New York Times and the Boston Globe obituaries. The Harvard Crimson report on the death cited an aneurysm and subsequent heart attack as the cause of death.

Gomes was perhaps most widely known to the Harvard community for his role in offering the benediction at Commencement, one of the many ceremonies and traditions of the University that he loved and celebrated. He was the bestselling author of books on the Bible, and bridged the political and cultural spectrum—a black Baptist preacher who gave the benediction at Ronald Reagan’s second presidential inaugural and who attracted much attention by revealing that he was gay in 1991 (see Andrew Tobias’s “Gay Like Me” from the January-February 1998 Harvard Magazine).

 

 

On March 10, the University announced that Wendel W. Meyer, a former Gomes colleague, would become acting Pusey minister in the Memorial Church immediately, and served during the search for a permanent successor.

Sub topics

You might also like

Trump Administration Expands Harvard Student Visa Vetting

State Department tells officials to screen social media, flag private accounts as suspicious.  

Harvard Cancelled Affinity Celebrations. Students Held Them Anyway.

In hotels, parks, and churches, graduates decried the end of DEI programs.

Saluting the 2025 Centennial Medalists

Four alumni of the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences are honored.

Most popular

These Student Speakers Have History to Share

A second-generation speaker, a conservationist, and a student from afar will deliver Commencement speeches — with no notes

Judge Blocks Trump’s Attempt to Bar International Students from Harvard

Government lawyers shifted approach, offering University time to respond.

Two Momentous Faculty Retirements

Arthur Kleinman and Harry Lewis depart the classroom.

Explore More From Current Issue

Paper Peepshows at Harvard's Baker Library

How “paper peepshows” brought distant realms to life

Publications by Harvard Authors Spring 2025: New Releases

Operatic counterculture, a Passover graphic novel, James Joyce’s biographer, and more

The Trump Administration's Impact on Higher Education

Unprecedented federal actions against research funding, diversity, speech, and more