Local Catholics express gratitude for what lives on because of Bishop Reilly

By Tanya Connor
The Catholic Free Press

In the wake of Bishop Reilly’s death, local Catholics recalled ongoing benefits he brought to the diocese and raved about his pastoral and personal qualities.

“He was a real leader” who related warmly and positively with people; people felt that, in him, they had a good pastor, said Msgr. Francis D. Kelly, a retired priest of the diocese who held leadership roles locally, nationally and in Rome. “He was such a man of the Church. The Church was his love, and being a bishop was his life.”

Bishop Reilly had St. Paul Cathedral renovated in 1996, turning it from a “barren, unappealing” place to “the beautiful church that it is today,” Msgr. Kelly said. The bishop also had to have the Chancery redone, “helped” by the March 1996 flood that left it in need of restoration.

Msgr. Kelly lived with Bishop Reilly at the bishop’s residence, and later at Southgate at Shrewsbury. At Southgate, Bishop Reilly was “a good example to the priests,” he said; he went to Mass there every morning, and “his constant refrain was: ‘Weren’t we blessed to get the vocation to be priests?’”

Bishop Reilly always said, in reference to his priesthood, “I wish I could start all over again,” Msgr. Richard F. Reidy noted in his prepared homily for Sunday Mass at Christ the King Parish in Worcester. The diocese’s vicar general, who lives there, applied to Bishop Reilly a Scripture used at that Mass: “The love of Christ impels us” (2 Cor 5:14).

He said the bishop loved God, the Church and people. This cleric who met popes and presidents was equally interested in, and present to, renowned speakers and the workers stacking the chairs after a talk. A gentleman, he was patient with a retired priest who repeated stories over and over, Msgr. Reidy said.

He was also “a man’s man.” As a young priest in Providence, he blessed boxers before their matches, Msgr. Reidy said. Behind closed doors in his room at St. Paul Cathedral’s rectory years later, the bishop was heard yelling, “What are you doing? Get out of here!” Msgr. Reidy asked Msgr. Thomas J. Sullivan, who lived with them, what was going on.

 “Oh, he’s just watching the Providence College basketball game,” came the reply.

Bishop Reilly was a spiritual father, celebrating special Masses for firefighters, police and other public servants, Msgr. Reidy noted. He said the bishop supported overseas disaster relief and the establishment locally of Compassion House for AIDS patients and Visitation House for women with crisis pregnancies.

Father David B. Galonek, a Southgate resident, said Bishop Reilly brought to the diocese Sister Mary Ann Bartell, a Carmelite Sister of the Eucharist. She is responsible for ministry to the retired priests and spends long hours helping with their medical needs.

“That was a blessing when he brought her over,” Father Galonek said. “We’ll never get a another one like her.”

“For 25 years now, I’ve been a volunteer with Sister’s ministry,” said Mavoureen “Vo” Robert, who directed Hampton Suites at Southgate, the assisted living section, where Bishop Reilly later lived. A member of St. Anne Parish in Shrewsbury, she is now director of Elder Outreach at St. Paul Cathedral, and also continues ministry to retired priests, which once included Bishop Reilly and Auxiliary Bishop George E. Rueger.

She recalled taking Bishop Reilly “shoe-shopping,” among other places.

“Our outings took extra time because he would stop and talk with everyone,” she said. “He always brought smiles to everybody’s face. … I can remember taking him to Celebrate Priesthood. … Droves of people went to say ‘hello’ to him.”

She respected him as a bishop, but also spent time with him when he wasn’t publicly fulfilling that role.

“I think as a layperson being with him one-on-one, I got to see him as a friend,” she said. “It was just like hanging out with a friend.” She and her husband, Matthew LaBarre, also spent holidays with Bishop Reilly and other clergy at the Carmelite Sisters of the Eucharist convent in Charlton.

“He was just such a regular person, so easy to talk to,” remarked Jeannette T. Bruso, of St. Brigid Parish in Millbury. She said she was once president of the Guild of Our Lady of Providence and sat with him at many of their dinners.

“He loved to sing ‘Danny Boy,’” she recalled. “You just loved him. He really was a wonderful priest.”

The Guild was a fundraising organization for St. Vincent Hospital. When the hospital became for-profit, “the bishop invited the Guild ... to become a diocesan organization,” she said. It continues to support charitable causes, including food pantries, Catholic school education and aid to mothers in need.

Also continuing on because of Bishop Reilly is St. Joseph Church in Worcester, which Bishop Timothy J. Harrington tried to close in 1992 and parishioners subsequently occupied for 13 months, until escorted out by police. After Bishop Reilly came and met with them, in 1996 he reopened the church building.

“I think one of his greatest gifts was his ability to listen … and that made a big difference,”Theresa Turgeon, one of those active in trying to save St. Joseph’s, said of Bishop Reilly.

She also experienced that gift of listening on an individual level.

“Whenever I ran into him, he had that moment to take,” and would ask, “How are you and how’s your family, Terry?” she recalled.

Perhaps she summed up others’ feelings when she said, “My heart is just filled with gratitude [for all that Bishop Reilly did], not only for us [at what is now called St. Joseph and St. Stephen Parish] but for everybody in the Diocese of Worcester.”