Rev. Peter Rettig

• Role at our parish: Parochial Vicar (Vicario Parroquial) since April 2025
• Also serves as: Chaplain at Trinity High School, Camp Hill
• Ordained: June 5, 2021, by Bishop Ronald W. Gainer of the Diocese of Harrisburg
• Hometown: Waynesboro, Pennsylvania
• Languages: English · Spanish (formed in part at the University of Navarra)

About Father Rettig

Father Peter Rettig is a son of central Pennsylvania — a cradle Catholic with German Catholic roots, raised in Waynesboro. Before he was a priest, he was a college student at Louisiana State University, where he studied International Relations and minored in Spanish. He did not, by his own account, plan to enter the seminary.

Path to the Priesthood

The call came during his college years — through prayer, through the intercession of St. John Vianney (the patron saint of parish priests), and, as Father Rettig has shared publicly, through two consecutive dreams his then-girlfriend had in which he was told he should become a priest. “Every time I thought about the priesthood,” he later said, “I felt consolation in prayer.”

His seminary formation took him across three institutions and two countries:

• St. Charles Borromeo Seminary · Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
• University of Navarra · Pamplona, Spain
• Mount St. Mary’s Seminary · Emmitsburg, Maryland

He was ordained to the priesthood by Bishop Ronald W. Gainer on June 5, 2021. His parents — including his father, who had once entered seminary himself — were, in his words, “both in tears” on the day of his ordination.

Ministry & Assignments

• 2021–2023 · Parochial Vicar at Sacred Heart of Jesus Parish, Lewistown, and St. Jude Thaddeus Parish, Mifflintown
• 2023–2025 · Parochial Vicar at St. Joseph Parish, York · Chaplain at York Catholic High School
• 2025–present · Parochial Vicar at St. Francis of Assisi, Harrisburg · Chaplain at Trinity High School, Camp Hill

A Bilingual Vicar for a Bilingual Parish

Father Rettig’s Spanish — from his minor at LSU and his year studying at Navarra in Pamplona — makes him a natural fit for the bilingual life of St. Francis of Assisi. Casa de San Francisco de Asís has been part of our parish since 1968 and bilingual since 1990; the Parochial Vicar’s ability to celebrate Mass and hear Confessions in Spanish is part of how we live the brand standard that Spanish is not a translation — it is a co-language.

How to Reach Father Rettig

• Parish office: (717) 232-1003
• Email: [email protected]
• Trinity High School: for matters relating to the school chaplaincy, contact Trinity directly