Search
-
February 28, 2025By Tanya Connor | The Catholic Free Press
Father Edward M. Ryan retired early for health reasons.
But now he’s back in a parish – as sacramental minister for St. Stanislaus in Warren. A permanent deacon – Deacon Dominick F. DeMartino – is administrator.
The Ash Wednesday collection taken in parishes throughout the diocese helps support retired priests, but Father Ryan’s not focusing on support for himself.
“I never went into the priesthood to make money,” he says. “I went in to serve God and country. But I consider myself a rich man – in memories.”
Let’s let him tell his story, with his sensitivity and sense of humor.
Father Richard Hannigan, an associate at St. Peter Parish in Worcester when Father Ryan was growing up, inspired him to consider priesthood.
“He made us [altar boys] feel important,” Father Ryan recalls. “We were knights of the altar. We had red capes.”
In seminary, the young Ryan joined a Navy chaplain program because two men he knew died in Vietnam.
“I always thought the priest should be with his people; if they’re going to [die] so should you,” he explains.
But, by the time he was ordained in 1974, Americans had left Vietnam and the Navy “didn’t need us.”
“I’ve got to find something to do,” he thought.
He remembered his grandmother from Germany saying family members left the Catholic Church in the United States because “they had no German priests.”
Father Ryan saw Hispanics here in similar straits. He learned Spanish and worked with them in parishes here and in South America, inspired by missionary priests he met as a child.
That’s in addition to his other ministry over the years as a parish priest, a hospital chaplain and raising nieces and nephews after his sister died at age 34.
In Bolivia, he “took care of the people,” in a parish with a big church and 12 mission stations.
“The roads were all dirt,” he recalls. “When it got wet, it was like driving on ice.” You had to pull your vehicle out of the mud. So, he traveled on horseback.
One day a woman told him, “You give us hope.” He maintains that was because he was celebrating Mass and visiting homes.
Due to illness, he returned to Worcester. Later, he went to Ecuador.
He figures he touched about 10,000 people there weekly; “I used to do between 65 and 85 baptisms a week” and 20-25 funerals, plus weekend Masses in a full church that held about 1,500.
For funerals he celebrated Mass, not a shorter service, figuring, “These people deserve the whole nine yards.”
Indians came on weekends to sell vegetables, sleeping in the marketplace Friday and Saturday nights.
“They’d be there Sunday morning at Mass” – the women, that is, the priest recalls. Knowing that men beat their wives, at one Mass he said, “If your husband wants to fight, tell him Father Ryan will fight him.”
The wives’ response?
“First time in my life I got a standing ovation.” And the husbands never took him up on the offer!
This priest who formerly had two golden retrievers and now owns – or is owned by – two Boston terriers and three cats, exhibits a heart for God’s non-human creatures too.
“One day I ran over a python” that completely blocked a road in Bolivia, neither head or tail visible, he recalls.
“I should get out and see if the snake’s O.K.,” he thought, then chided himself, “Are you nuts?”
Arriving at one of the parishes he was to serve in Ecuador, he entered the open church to pray, and discovered four live donkeys inside.
“They’ve got to visit the church too,” he reasoned.
Back in the states, after shattering a bone, he found a loon with a similar injury and brought it to a vet, who informed him it had to be euthanized.
“You could’ve saved the bird,” he complained to God. He felt like God responded, “Don’t think I sent you to save the bird; I sent the bird to save you.”
How?
“He gave me something to live for,” Father Ryan says. “I was thinking about the bird; I wasn’t thinking about my pain.”
St. Stanislaus Parish furthered that.
One day Msgr. Richard F. Reidy, now bishop-elect of Norwich, told him Bishop McManus “wanted to know if you’d take the Masses” at St. Stanislaus during a time of transition there.
For awhile Father Ryan was also sacramental minister at St. Paul Parish in Warren, but now it’s an oratory with its own priest. Father Ryan celebrates two Lord’s Day Masses and four weekday Masses at St. Stanislaus, and does other sacramental ministry requiring a priest.
He’s grateful to have Deacon DeMartino as administrator; “it would be way too much for me.” The 78-year-old priest said heart attacks led to his retirement at age 68.
“I’m just glad I’ve got something to get up [for] in the morning,” he says. “I’ve got purpose and meaning.” The people have a priest “that cares about them, and they take care of me; they cook for me.” He can cook, but it’s nice to have someone else do it, he says.
Sometimes he’s forgotten what to say at Mass, Deacon DeMartino reminds him, and the people understand; they figure he’s having a senior moment.
“What more can I want?” asks Father Ryan. “I look forward to seeing them. That’s what God called me to do. You don’t fight with the Boss.”
Bishop's Letter for Ash Wednesday 2025
Dear friends in Christ,
Throughout our lives as Catholics, we look to our parish priests for support in good times and in bad. For instance, they have been instrumental in offering God’s sacramental grace at various milestones in our lives, as well as God’s healing and comfort when loved ones faced illness or death. For those priests who are now retired, it is time for us to care for them.
On this Ash Wednesday, March 5, I invite you to support our Annual Diocesan Collection for the Support of our Diocesan Priests who have retired in good standing.
Unless illness intervened, our priests have cared for parish communities until they were at least 75. Some remained as pastors into their 80s. Many continue to serve as senior priests, temporary administrators, and offer sacramental coverage for pastors who are ill or on vacation, to name just a few examples. We value their efforts and are grateful for their continued help.
Our expenses for retired priests include a monthly stipend, medical insurance, and, for some, assisted living and nursing home costs. Last year our total cost for priests’ retirement was $2,421,072.46.
Each December our diocese participates in a national collection for retired nuns, brothers and religious order priests. We thank you for your support of them. None of that collection, however, assists in the care of our retired diocesan priests.
Four years ago, we began the Ash Wednesday Collection to help care for the retired priests of our own diocese. We appreciate your past generosity and ask that, as part of your Lenten almsgiving, you consider prayerfully a sacrificial gift to support priests who through the decades have supported you and your family.
Our 46 retired and senior priests have served in the majority of our parishes. They are Monsignors Richard E. Collette, Anthony S. Czarnecki, John E. Doran, Michael G. Foley, Francis D. Kelly, James A. Mongelluzzo and Francis J. Scollen; and Fathers Ernest P. Allega, Roger R. Boucher, C. Michael Broderick, Paul F. Campbell, James F. Carmody, George A. Charland, William N. Cormier, Andre E. Dargis, David E. Doiron, George A. Dunkley, John A. Dwyer, Thomas F. Egan, Lawrence J. Esposito, John J. Foley, Richard A. Fortin, David B. Galonek, Raymond M. Goodwin, Bernard J. Grochowski, John F. Hamm, Edward J. Hanlon, John E. Horgan, James A. Houston, Joseph J. Jurgelonis, Terence T. Kilcoyne, Leo-Paul J. LeBlanc, Theodore R. Laperle, Richard P. Lewandowski, Thirburse F. Millott, Chester J. Misiewicz, Son A. Nguyen, Emerito Ortiz, James B. O’Shea, Conrad S. Pecevich, Francis J. Roach, Edward M. Ryan, William F. Sanders, Thaddeus X. Stachura, James M. Steuterman, and Paul J. Tougas.
Along with your financial support for this collection I ask that your keep these priests in your prayers that they may continue to live their vocation to save souls.
With every prayerful best wish, I remain
Sincerely yours in Christ,
Most Reverend Robert J. McManus
Bishop of Worcester
