April 7, 1934 – April 30, 2020
Jack William Bremer was born on April 7, 1934 to a truck driver/farmer and a teacher in Iola, Kansas. Descended from German immigrant dairy farmers, his grandfather died at 53 from brucellosis. The large family was now the responsibility of Jack’s father, Francis John, who moved his mother and siblings into town and began an ambitious life that ended with his owning a Cadillac, learning to fly a small plane, going on safari to Africa, and running a successful small business in Arkansas. Likewise, Jack began a similar impossible climb, from small town paper boy, running his own bike repair shop, working in high school as a photographer for area newspapers, going to the local college (Ottawa University) where he and his best friend John Ross became national debate champions. He was accepted at Yale Divinity School but had received his draft notification and had to serve in the US Army; two years he always claimed to be ashamed of. He tried to get a Conscientious Objector deferral but was dissuaded. He married his college sweetheart, a minister’s daughter from Canada, Marilyn Havens Hetherington, and when the Army (happily) was done with him, they packed the old station wagon, and took the family up from Fort Gordon, and drove into Yale Divinity School with drying diapers out the window and a smile on his face.
When asked whom he would like as an advisor, he innocently requested H. Richard Niebuhr, considered the greatest theologian of the 20th Century. To everyone’s shock, Niebuhr agreed. Jack joyously studied and grew intellectually; staying to get a second degree and work in a low-income area of New Haven.
From this Ivy League tower, Jack returned to the Kansas prairie and was appointed by the Methodist denomination to serve a rural parish in Blue Mound. The family arrived; his wife in some shock at seeing there was an outhouse at the parsonage as the plumbing was not working. He preached long, complex, politically fiery sermons to the tiny stunned congregations gathered in the three rickety wooden churches. The Bishop, sensing Rev. Bremer’s talents might be more useful elsewhere, sent him to East Topeka, a low income Black/Hispanic neighborhood. He became immersed in the Civil Rights movement and was a community organizer. Now began his life of social action, fighting against the Vietnam War, marching for racial equality, speaking against the death penalty (working with Carl Menninger and Bill Lucero), serving on missions in Central America, and eventually earning his Doctor of Ministry while serving as a parish pastor and teaching at the local college.
When his daughters left for college and his marriage fell apart, he transitioned into campus ministry and again became deeply immersed in politics, this time working with Iranian students. During the Iranian Hostage Crisis he went to Teheran and was allowed to visit and serve Easter communion to the hostages and served as a mediator, reporting to President Carter on his return. He travelled extensively with students to Russia, Cuba, Nicaragua and El Salvador. Dr. Bremer was given the Francis Asbury Award for his work at Kansas University and Northwestern.
After 40 years as a pastor, educator, speaker, political activist and community organizer, he retired to Vermont, where he served on the Ethics Committee at the hospital, got to know Bernie Sanders quite well, met Barak Obama on the campaign trail, attended First Methodist Church, and travelled to Korea, Hawaii, and all over the United States, always taking stunning photographs. He was married several times and had several close relationships but finally found a cheerful partner in Lilly. They had met many years ago on one of his trips to China, and they reconnected in the last few years of his life, travelling, and enjoying life together. Jack is survived by his wife, Lilly, his daughters Deborah (Richard) and Sarah (Peter), his grandchildren, Hazel and Moses.
His legacy was similar to his immigrant ancestors that strove to have a better life, they took risks, worked hard, and had tremendous confidence that almost anything was possible. He often found himself in remarkable circumstances: in the middle of the Iranian Embassy surrounded by guns and political battle, in the middle of China drinking hot tea on a sweltering day, in South Korea amazed at the order and beauty of dense urban areas, across the desk from the greatest theologian of the century, in the Oval Office shaking the hand of Jimmy Carter, dancing on the ferry during Bernie Sander’s annual Birthday Bash, drinking a large glass of warm buttermilk on a hot August day while visiting a local farm and hoping he could make it out quick enough to throw up out of sight, swimming in the warm waters of Hawaii, visiting Havana before one did such a thing, wandering around the Yale campus, and he would think, “I’m just a Kansas boy, how did I get here?”
His Christian faith was more intellectual than emotional, and he felt called to fight policy over waiting upon the Holy Spirit. His cynicism only grew towards the rich and powerful, as he had seen first hand the suffering of those who have no voice, no power and no safety net. He was not a family man, unless it was the family of man. Like Jesus, he might have been happier as a priest, but he did love his family as best he could.
Jack’s favorite Bible verse was from Romans 8:
For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons,[k] neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.
May we be connected to him eternally, through the love of God.