Fr. Michael Kenny, OAR (1974-2008)

Monday, September 15 was the day I was scheduled to return from California to New York. I had spent several weeks, following my vacation, helping at Mary Star of the Sea Parish in Oxnard during the absence of Fr. Michael Kenny, who was visiting his family in New York. During that final week of my stay at Mary Star, people kept asking me when Fr. Michael would be returning to the parish. He was, as a matter of fact, I told them, due to return on September 19. On the day of my departure I celebrated the 8:00 AM Mass in the parish before leaving for the airport. By coincidence the intention for the day—the Feast of the Sorrowful Mother—was for Fr. Michael Kenny.

After an uneventful flight from Los Angeles to Newark, I was met at the airport by one of our friars who kindly drove me back to Suffern where I am currently stationed. On walking in the door I was met by the Prior who said: “I have some bad news.” The tone of voice was enough: I immediately thought that one of our elder friars, a number of whom are quite ill, had passed away. As I was emotionally tightening up for what I knew was going to be a sad moment I could not have anticipated what I was about to hear: “Michael Kenny just died.” My first, purely gut-level reaction was . . . No, that’s not possible; it has to be a joke. Michael is at home with his family; he’s due to go back to Oxnard in a few days; the people are expecting him . . . Unfortunately it was no joke, but for a moment everything froze. I was speechless, as were the other friars who were gathering in the hall around me. We looked at each other and then looked away in silence. It wasn’t time for tears yet, only for the mind to try and grapple with something unthinkable. And then the sadness rushed in, feeling like a heavy weight coming down on one’s shoulders. Our brother Michael, 34 years old, an ordained priest for only five years, was gone.

I remember the rest of that week as being kind of surreal; life went on but there was a hole in the middle of it. Each day we remembered Fr. Michael and his family in our community prayers, morning and evening. The Wake Service was held at our church of St. John in the Bronx where the Kenny family was and is an integral part of the parish family; where his mother has been on the parish staff for so many years and where his sister and aunt have been so visible at all the parish functions and celebrations. Fr. Ed Fagan, pastor of St. John and a close friend of the Kenny family, conducted the prayer service that Thursday evening. Michael lay in the open casket traditional for priests, dressed in his Recollect habit and surrounded by photographs telling the marvelous story of his priestly vocation as well as by beautiful sprays of flowers from family and friends, parish organizations and the parishioners of Mary Star of the Sea, his first and only priestly assignment. Fr. Fagan spoke from the heart about the loss suffered by Michael’s family and by the Augustinian Recollects, and searched through Scripture readings and his own prayerful reflections for the faith that we profess in Christ as our light and our hope in the face of death.

The funeral Mass for Fr. Michael was held at St. John on Friday, September 19. The liturgy was a perfect reflection of what Fr. Michael would find beautiful and moving in Christian prayer, given his own interest in liturgy and music as well as his sense of community, gathering as a believing family to give praise to God in the Holy Eucharist. The main celebrant for the Mass was Fr. Peter McCrann, who had baptized Michael and preached at his first Mass in St. John’s. He spoke about Christ the high priest and how Michael’s priesthood, like that of his Divine Master, had been totally dedicated to carrying out God’s will and serving God’s people. Like Christ also, Michael’s priesthood had been short, ended suddenly by death (“not one moment too soon nor one moment too late”), attaining a meaning and value not based on length of time but rather in the depth and joy of commitment. Joining Fr. McCrann around the altar in concelebration were the members of the St. John community, local Recollects of St. Augustine Province and the St. Nicholas delegation, and priests and classmates from Immaculate Conception Seminary in South Orange, NJ, where Michael had studied and received his priestly training. Fr. Michael’s family, bravely facing their great personal loss, had carefully chosen the readings and music for the Mass, selecting in recognition of their Irish roots the moving “Lady of Knock, Queen of Ireland” for the Communion hymn. As the overflowing crowd streamed out of the church, Fr. Michael’s coffin remained stationary on the sidewalk while a single bagpipe echoed the well-known “Amazing Grace” allowing the many priests who were present to sprinkle it with holy water in final farewell.

With the completion of the Mass, the funeral procession left St. John’s for Ascension Cemetery in Monsey, NY, where the Augustinian Recollect plot is located. Once again, Fr. Fagan led the grave side service before family, friends, and Recollect friars, who ended the prayers for Fr. Michael by singing “Salve Regina”, traditional for the burial of Recollect friars and appropriately reflecting Fr. Michael’s devotion to the Mother of God.

After the service had concluded everyone was invited back to Tagaste Monastery in Suffern for lunch and refreshments. Community gatherings are not always moments of celebration but they always provide a supportive and reassuring environment, and this was what everyone needed at that moment.

In his remarks at the memorial service held at Mary Star of the Sea Church in Oxnard, CA, before a standing-room-only congregation, Fr. Antonio “Joy” Zabala, Fr. Michael’s pastor and mentor, stated that “We could only be grateful and thankful to God for having been given this wonderful privilege of having Fr. Michael as our associate pastor. And we really could not thank God enough for the blessing of knowing such a great man . . . a great and promising religious . . . a great priest . . . and to all of us a great friend and confidant.”

To Fr. Michael’s family—his mother, sister and brother, his loving aunt—and to all the members of his “spiritual family” we express our gratitude for the gift of Fr. Michael’s life as well as the hope that he has truly reached that state which, as St. Augustine says “is life for God, life with God, life in God, the very life of God Himself.”

Fr. John Gruben, OAR