Donnie Wiltshire, Longtime Leader of Baptist Deaf Ministries, Dies at 73
He planted a Deaf church in New Orleans and spent 20 years leading North Carolina Baptist work among Deaf, blind and disabled people. His funeral is today in Jasper, Texas.
See where this is ›JASPER, Texas —
Donnie Wiltshire, who spent two decades leading North Carolina Baptists' special ministries to Deaf and blind people, people with developmental disabilities and people learning English, died Oct. 21 in the Jasper, Texas, area. He was 73, the Biblical Recorder reported.
Wiltshire had battled glioblastoma, an aggressive brain cancer, for more than a year after he was diagnosed in late summer 2025. He had served First Baptist Church of Jasper first as interim pastor and then as pastor from January 2021, stepping down at the end of August.
Wiltshire was born Dec. 12, 1952, at Tinker Air Force Base in Oklahoma City and grew up mostly in Corpus Christi, Texas, where as a teenager he became the interpreter for a church's Deaf ministry. He studied at Howard Payne College in Brownwood, Texas, earned a master of divinity from Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary in Fort Worth, Texas, and later a doctor of theology in church history from New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary.
Much of his ministry was among the Deaf. He planted Canal Boulevard Baptist Deaf Church in New Orleans and pastored it for nearly 12 years, then led the Deaf congregation at First Baptist Church in Memphis, Tennessee, from 1990 to 1999. He also directed the Tri-State Deaf School of Theology for many years.
From 1999 to 2019 he was senior consultant for special ministries with the Baptist State Convention of North Carolina. The work included Happiness Retreats for people with developmental disabilities and literacy and English-as-a-second-language missions that drew more than 35,000 students and 12,000 tutors over two decades. He also led Deaf disaster relief teams, including several trips to Honduras after Hurricane Mitch in 1998.
Wiltshire attended 50 consecutive meetings of the Southern Baptist Conference of the Deaf, where he served on the board and as historian. “Donnie helped strengthen the foundation upon which future generations of Deaf Southern Baptists continue to build,” said board chairman Aric Randolph.
“He found joy in everything he did and shared that joy with so many people,” said Irma, his wife of 53 years. He is also survived by a son, two daughters, 10 grandchildren and a brother.
The funeral is set for 2 p.m. CDT Monday, Oct. 26, at First Baptist Church of Jasper, after a visitation from 1 to 2 p.m., with burial in Kirbyville Cemetery. The family suggested memorial gifts to the International Mission Board or the Southern Baptist Conference of the Deaf.
