St. James Office of Faith Formation

St. James Office of Faith Formation The Office of Faith Formation at Saint James Parish in Manville, RI located in the Diocese of Providence

09/12/2026

The Quiet Corner by Father John A. Kiley 12 September 2026

Diocesan priests may indeed retire from their parishes at age 70 but they do not retire from the priesthood even into old age. Fr. Frank O’Hara, sixty-seven years a priest, is still at the altar at St. Mark Church in Cranston several days a week. Up north here in Woonsocket, Fr. Richard Desaulnier assists regularly at St. Joseph Church in this city. Fr. Raymond Tetreault ably assists the new pastor at St. Aidan/St. Patrick in nearby Cumberland.

Down in South County a good number of priests assist the local pastors. Fr. Joseph Creedon often leads the worship at the Christian Brothers home in Narragansett. Msgr. Carlo Montecalvo drove regularly from North Kingston to Westerly to help with Masses. And the East Bay is no different. Bishop Tobin has offered the Holy Sacrifice at Our Lady of Mount Carmel in Bristol and Fr. David Ricard has a long drive from North Smithfield to help the pastor of St. Mary of the Bay in Warren.

Certainly offering daily and Sunday Masses at the diocese’s many parishes is the greatest service a retired priest may render. Yet their contribution to diocesan life does not end there. Years ago, area hospitals were sacramentally serviced by the nearest parish church. St. Anne’s rectory in Woonsocket was staffed with four priests who would take all the calls at the nearby hospital wards on Cass Avenue. St. Joseph parish in Pawtucket serviced Memorial Hospital ably, but again with four priests in residence. The Cathedral clergy similarly serviced Rhode island Hospital. Well there are no more four priest rectories! So the priests resident in an area (active and retired) take two and sometimes three days of duty per month for emergency calls. The duty, frankly and honestly, is not burdensome – but there is always that rare call at 3am when a bit more priestly dedication is required.

Again, with today’s limited priestly population, Catholic nursing homes especially and other senior citizen residences also rely greatly the ministry of retired priests. St. Antoine’s Residence and St. Antoine’s Villa in North Smithfield are entirely serviced by retired priests; a few are in residence, a few live the area. Mt. St. Rita Nursing Home in Cumberland also appreciates the attention given by retired priests. The Little Sisters of the Poor at the Jeanne Jugan residence in Pawtucket were recently delighted to have a retired pastor, Fr. Paul Grenon, take up residence and respond to their needs. St. Clare’s Home in Newport is equally grateful to the area’s retired priests.

For many years, two or three priests residing in a local rectory was the happy rule for most parishes in the diocese of Providence and for most of New England. Now there are fewer than a half-dozen Rhode Island rectories that can boast even two priests in residence. Alas, pastors who are alone might easily get two funerals on the same morning or a wake at the same time a parish council meeting had been scheduled or even a baptism on the afternoon of the parish picnic. Many a parish priest easily solves these challenges by a call to a nearby retired priest -- who is only too happy to save the day!

Fifteen years ago, upon my retirement from active ministry, Fr. Bernard Healy, then pastor of St. Ambrose parish in Lincoln, hired me to render part time help at the Albion parish. Week day and week end Masses there and at St. James in Manville have happily filled and fulfilled the past decade and a half. But retired priests not only render service. They are also well serviced themselves by the regular and affirming contact with the many assorted parishioners they encounter on the church steps and at the parish’s festivals, in the confessional and sometimes at the sick bed. The sacerdotal services of this diocese’s retired priests not only contribute to the area’s spiritual and ecclesial enrichment. The opportunity to continue priestly service, even on a part-time basis, is a boon for the aging clergyman as well! Offering the Word and the sacraments to a believing community is always reassuring.

On the weekend of September 19/20, the parishes of the Providence diocese will sponsor the annual collection for the support of the area’s many retired (or semi-retired) clergy. The financial and medical benefits which your donation guarantees for the local senior clergy will be outlined in next week’s Quiet Corner.
COMPLETE

09/06/2026

Mass 9/6/26

08/30/2026

Mass 8/30/26

08/23/2026

Mass 8/23/26

08/16/2026

Liturgy

The Quiet Corner Father John A. Kiley 15 August 2026 Mary of Nazareth is rightly recalled and...
08/16/2026

The Quiet Corner Father John A. Kiley 15 August 2026

Mary of Nazareth is rightly recalled and uniquely honored as both virgin and mother. Her dual vocation to dedicate herself entirely to God, effectively symbolized by her virginity, and at the same time place herself at the service of humanity, tenderly indicated by her maternity, indicates the balance that the Church and every believer must maintain in their common and personal religious lives. Christians, like Mary, are called to be both chaste and fruitful, to be respectful in their friendships and to be generous in their relationships.
Blessed Mary’s perpetual virginity, enjoyed before, during and after the birth of her son, was not a sterile refusal to embrace human relationships. In fact Mary welcomed human relationships and responded warmly to personal encounters. Mary hastened from northern Nazareth to southern Judea to tend to her cousin Elizabeth for six months. Mary was touched by the plight of Cana’s newlyweds, inducing Jesus to perform his first miracle to relieve their embarrassment. Mary welcomed a new companionship in later life when she and St. John joined households at Jesus’ final instruction. Mary offered her prayers, support and presence to the infant Church establishing itself after Pentecost. Although Mary did not “know man” at any time during her earthly journey, she was eager to reach out to her fellow men and women on any number of occasions effectively producing good fruit all during her life. Mary’s was a fruitful virginity.
Uniquely in human history, the Blessed Virgin Mary was also a mother. Dutifully responding to the invitation announced through an angel, Mary consented to bear the Son of God, Jesus Christ, while sharing parenthood with Joseph to whom she was espoused. Remaining a virgin, Mary embraced family life as mother and wife. Mary chastely entered into a close relationship with her husband Joseph, travelling ninety miles with him to register at Bethlehem, and probably walking all the way! As good wife and good mother, Mary endured exile in Egypt rather than endanger her son. Mary shared the responsibilities of Jewish family life with Joseph, presenting their infant son at the Temple for blessing and making sure that the solemn Jewish festivals were a regular part of their maturing son’s life. Mary shared maternal heartbreak with Joseph when the boy Jesus was not to be found and she rejoiced with Joseph as their son “grew in wisdom, age and grace before God and man” at home in Nazareth. In later life, Mary, now on her own, displayed great concern for her son’s ambitions, hoping along with other relatives that he was not overdoing his mission. Mary, in near solitude, stood at the foot of the Cross as her son breathed his last and then received his limp body into her loving and distraught hands. Mary’s proved to be a fertile maternity, placing herself entirely at the service of her son, her husband and her God. Hers was a uniquely chaste but abundantly fruitful motherhood.
Every Christian, like Mary, is called to chastity. Christians must be chaste, always and everywhere exercising their life-giving bodily functions in the service of God’s designs for the human race. Chastity is certainly expected from the unmarried Christian who has not made an enduring spousal commitment to stable family life. The unchaste and unstable extra-marital relationships that abound in today’s society serve neither God nor humanity. And chastity is also expected from the married Christian whose loving encounters must always be open to the transmission of life. Authentic family planning does require preparation and sacrifice. Yet such maturity can actually enhance romance, increasing longing and demanding respect.
Every Christian, like Mary, is called to fecundity. Virgin or spouse, married or unmarried, cleric or lay, the Christian must be fruitful within the Church and within society. Mary was certainly alert to the needs of the world around her – the pregnant Elizabeth, the hapless newlyweds, the infant Church. And Mary was alert to her own vocational demands as good wife, good mother, good Jew.
Christians can only venerate Mary’s singularity. Her role as virgin and mother is historically unique. Yet Christians can emulate Mary’s superiority. A modest chastity and a productive charity are within the grasp of every believer. COMPLETE

08/09/2026

Mass

07/31/2026

The Quiet Corner By Father John A. Kiley 2 August 2026

The marvelous multiplication of the loaves and fishes by which Jesus fed more than five thousand followers focuses the believer’s attention on Christ’s “taking, blessing, breaking, and giving,” a solemn, four-fold action which is recalled not only here in the miraculous meadow but also in all the narratives of the Last Supper. Anglican Bishop John A. T. Robinson, while a chaplain at Cambridge, reviewed these four memorable steps which, to this day, still form the core of the Eucharistic celebration, the Mass.

Unlike Jesus’ other miracles in which his words and gestures are his only resource, Christ this time asks for a contribution from his beneficiaries. It is the crowds, in the person of the young boy, who offer Jesus the material that he is going to multiply and transform. As Jesus takes the loaves and fish from the lad, and as he holds the bread secured by his disciples at the Paschal meal, he is anticipating the presentation of the gifts at every Mass. The bread and wine at Mass do not (or should not) originate from the sanctuary. They are placed in the midst of the congregation, brought to the altar by members of the community, then received by the priest as a presentation from the people of God. These gifts represent the people. They represent their daily lives. They represent the farmers and vintners and bakers and truckers and salespersons without whom the elements of bread and wine would never make it to the parish church. Such manmade gifts are the secular intruding into the sacred. Thus all of life, not only prayers and pieties, are presented to God each week at Mass.

Once Christ took the loaves and fishes from the young man, he blessed them; he changed them; he transformed them. Food for a handful became food for the hoard of men and women sitting there before Christ. At Mass, the worldly elements of bread and wine are similarly blessed, changed, and transformed into the sacred elements of Christ’s Body and Blood. Food for the body becomes food for the soul. Now, as then, Christ himself is the miracle worker, the catalyst, the change agent in the person of the priest. The people present their gifts (bread and wine) to Christ and Christ will present his gifts (Body and Blood) to the people. At Mass as in the meadow, the blessing, the transformation, the consecration is entirely the generous action of Christ.

The breaking of the bread is not merely a practical gesture to insure that everybody participates in a large, communal meal. The bread broken draws the worshipper’s attention to the belief that the Mass is truly the re-presentation of Calvary. It is the broken, bruised and beaten Christ who is sacramentally present on Catholic altars every time Mass is celebrated. “This is my Body which is given for you…This is the cup of my Blood which is shed for you…” The Mass makes present again that moment of self-giving when Jesus handed over his body and poured out his blood for the salvation of mankind. It is certainly true that Christ is risen and dies no more and that it is the Risen Christ whom believers receive in Holy Communion. But they receive the risen Christ enshrined as at the moment of his death: the body broken, the blood poured out, the sacred elements separated as in death on Golgotha.

The loaves were taken, blessed, broken and finally given, that is, shared among the people for their sustenance and refreshment. The giving, or the sharing, occurs on two levels: Christ shares the bread with his followers, symbolized by the disciples, and then the followers, through the ministry of the disciples, share this bread with one another. It is not too difficult to see the role of the enduring Church in this scenario. At the grasslands, Jesus entrusts the blessed bread to his closest friends. They in turn do the work of Christ distributing that bread to the vast crowd before them. The disciples were the agents of Christ’s concern. Today the Church is Christ’s instrument of salvation among the masses of mankind. It is through the Church that the Bread of Life and the words of Revelation are brought to the nations of the world.

Taking, blessing, breaking and giving: the kindly actions of Christ on the grasslands of Galilee are recalled daily in the kindest of all his actions, the Catholic Mass. COMPLETE

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Manville, RI
02838

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