Fr. Francis Peluso, OAR
1934-2006

 

 

The phone call that came on September 15 was an unwelcome one; sadly, however, it was not unexpected: Fr. Francis Peluso, OAR, had died at the age of 72, having just celebrated his 45th anniversary as a priest. For a month prior to his death and shortly after arriving at his new assignment at St. John Parish in the Bronx, New York, Fr. Frank had been hospitalized with a mysterious illness which his doctors at Columbia-Presbyterian Medical Center referred to as a form of encephalitis, but which seemed to elude definitive diagnosis or treatment. After taking sick he remained to the end almost totally unresponsive and unaware of people and things around him, an unfortunate ending for a man who had always enjoyed an intense level of interaction with others.

Funeral services for Fr. Frank took place at St. John Church: the wake was held on September 17-18, and the Funeral Mass on September 19. Fr. Charles Huse, prior provincial, was main celebrant at the Mass at which many Recollects and diocesan priests concelebrated, along with Bishops Ignatius Catanello, auxiliary of the Brooklyn diocese and a long-time friend of the Recollects, and Paul Walsh, auxiliary of the Rockville Center diocese and pastor of Queen of the Most Holy Rosary Parish, where Fr. Frank had been on assignment for the last three years. Fr. Edward Fagan, pastor of St. John, was the homilist for the occasion; the students from Tagaste Monastery served as acolytes. Fr. Ed reflected in his homily that the day on which Fr. Frank died—the Feast of the Sorrowful Mother—was appropriate, since surely Mary had accompanied him in his recent sufferings as she had accompanied her own Son on the cross.

Fr. Frank’s last remaining sibling, his sister Millie, is confined to a nursing home in the Southwest, but was represented at the funeral by her daughter and Fr. Frank’s niece, Angela. His cousins Nina and Mary from Long Island, and other family members were also present. The burial took place immediately after the Mass at the community plot in Ascension Cemetery in Monsey, New York, and was followed by a reception and lunch at Tagaste for some 60 people including members of Fr. Frank’s family, SARs from St. John, St. Cloud, and Tagaste, as well as Cursillistas from the New York Archdiocese, whom Fr. Frank had served as spiritual director for many years.

I knew Fr. Francis Peluso for most of my life—almost 40 years. Early on in our relationship I learned that he was a complex and often contradictory man, gifted with a great many talents . . . It was a hot summer afternoon in 1967 when I first met Frank. I was a young, newly-professed Augustinian Recollect friar who had just been transferred along with five companions from the Monastery of St. Augustine in Kansas City, Kansas, to Tagaste Monastery in Suffern, New York, where Frank was director of students. When we arrived, we found a house overflowing with students—those were still the days of vocational abundance—a superior, Fr. Louis Muñoz, who had been my novice master in Kansas City, and one busy director of students who had, himself, recently returned from advanced study in Rome at the “Biblicum”, the department for scripture study of Gregorian University. I would imagine that any other person transitioning from the ethereal regions of advanced biblical scholarship to the rough-and-tumble world of trying to bring some discipline, spiritual focus, and unity into the lives of a group of young men living in the “anything goes” 1960s would have felt overwhelmed—but not Frank Peluso. He struck me from the beginning as someone supremely confident in his ability to get the job done—whatever that job might be!

Some time after our arrival, Frank began attending classes at Iona College where he earned a Master’s Degree in psychology, a field that was just being recognized by religious communities as an essential component in priestly and religious formation programs. Although Frank was well qualified to teach theology in a university or seminary setting, he settled for something less formal and more practical, teaching religion at St. Thomas Aquinas High School in Bardonia and helping to organize the “TI” (Tagaste Institute), an extremely successful program of theology courses offered to the laity of Rockland County, and which drew enthusiastic crowds from many local parishes.

Frank was as involved with the Order as with the Church. In 1968 he left for Rome as a delegate to the special General Chapter, entrusted with those major revisions of the Constitutions commanded by Vatican II. I remember standing on the porch at Tagaste in early July as he left, loudly proclaiming: “We’ll be singing Christmas carols in Rome.” He sounded more like he was relishing than lamenting the idea! (The Chapter did last four months but, happily, ended before Christmas.)

In later years Frank often reminded me that I was a “P.P.” . . . a Peluso Product. He was right about that in the sense that I spent most of my formation years under his direction, first at Tagaste and later at St. Cloud Monastery in West Orange, New Jersey. There, in the early 1970s, we opened the house which is currently the provincial residence, but which, during those years, served as a residence for students attending Seton Hall University. Frank could be a tough person to live and work with, having a strong character and a very personal sense of mission regarding how he felt called to use the authority given him by the Order—first as formation director and later as the prior provincial who served more times than anyone else in the history of St. Augustine Province. In many ways I looked up to Frank. His preaching caught my attention: his words seemed to flow naturally, being conversational, humorous, and well thought out. His level of energy and the scope of his activities were also impressive. I disagreed with Frank on a variety of issues—both as a student and later on as a solemn professed religious and priest—and yet I found him on a remarkable number of occasions, even as provincial, willing to listen and allow himself to be open to contrary points of view.

There is no doubt that being provincial for so many years took its toll on Frank in spite of the fact that he was a “workaholic” and seemed to thrive on stress. Shortly after completing his first two terms in office he suffered one of several heart attacks. His drive and energy level, however, never seemed to diminish. As provincial he had made some difficult and controversial decisions, most especially regarding the implementation of the province’s determination to engage in long-range planning and consolidation in the face of a shrinking membership and decline in vocations—a determination that led eventually to the withdrawal of the Recollects from the Midwestern region and, in particular, such historic Recollect centers as Omaha, Nebraska, and Kansas City, Kansas with the motive of focusing the province’s pastoral and vocational efforts in the heavily Catholic areas of New York and Los Angeles. Frank Peluso contributed notably during his time as provincial to making real the desire of the province to become a truly bilingual and bicultural entity, a bridge to the growing Hispanic community in the United States, building on a ministry that had engaged the Recollects from the beginning of the province’s history. That ministry became personal for Frank through the many years he spent in Cursillo ministry in New York. He also helped to set the community on a sound financial basis and consistently supported—yes, sometimes in an overly controlling way—the vocational and formation work of the province and the development of our formation centers in Oxnard, California, and Suffern, New York.

Frank could be rough with people and rough with his fellow religious. He could also be kind and considerate. That mixture of contradictory qualities constituted the character of Frank Peluso, that unique personal history which he shared with us and now carries into eternity. He may have been liked or disliked, but he was never boring and could never be accused of being lazy or lacking a sense of purpose. He was certainly the most imitated friar in the province (and perhaps in the Order)—everyone from youngest to oldest knew about his dramatic gestures (“we Italians are verrry expressive,” as he would say) and the exaggerated inflections in his voice (Fr-aank!)—but he always accepted the razzing in good humor: “You’re gonna get it!” he would threaten, but with a smile on his face.

Shortly before he became ill, Frank gave me the first chapter of his “memoirs”, which he had spoken about writing for a number of years, and which he finished before he died. “You wrote the authorized history of the Province,” he said to me with the beginnings of a smirk on his lips, “but I’m going to write the unauthorized version.” It all sounded very mysterious—like, finally all the dark secrets of the province were going to be brought to light! In the first lines of his manuscript he spoke about the Italian kid from Brooklyn with all the sisters who decided in the mid-1950s that he had a religious vocation with the Augustinian Recollects, and who was later shipped off to Spain with several classmates—they know who they are!—for formation studies. Knowing Frank, I was expecting to hear a great deal of drama about the trials and tribulations of living in Iberia. Surprisingly, that first chapter is remarkably restrained. How the rest turns out remains to be seen: I do suspect, however, that it should be interesting reading! . . . Ciao, Frank.

Fr. John Gruben, OAR (P.P.)

Funeral Mass for Fr. Francis Peluso,
St John's Church, Bronx, New York.

Fr. Edward Fagan delivers the homily for Fr. Peluso.