Father Patrick Ryan, who helped build a church in Venezuela and once told two close friends he would serve in ministry as long as he was physically able, died July 14. He was 91.
Dr. Michael and Sharon Bowen first met Father Ryan in 1988 when they moved from Shoreview to Roseville and were looking for a parish to join. Both vividly recall going to Mass at St. Rose of Lima in Roseville for the first time that year, and listening to Father Ryan, who served as pastor of the parish from 1981 to 1994.
“We walked out (after Mass) and Michael looked at me and said, ‘He’s a real holy man,’” Sharon, 74, recalled.
“I just felt a real connection there,” said Michael, 72.
Michael had grown up as a Methodist in Mississippi, but attended Mass regularly with Sharon, a lifelong Catholic, after they married 45 years ago. After just two more Masses at St. Rose, Michael decided to convert to Catholicism.
“I was very busy” working as a pulmonologist, Michael said. “And he (Father Ryan) took the time to meet with me one-on-one for a year.”
“I think, right there, it shows what kind of person Father was,” Sharon said. “He just always was available for everyone. That’s such a gift he gave us. We’re forever grateful for that.”
Michael’s conversion to the Catholic faith was the start of a lifelong friendship the couple had with Father Ryan, who regularly came over for dinner on holidays like Thanksgiving, Christmas and Easter, and led them to switch to St. Andrew in St. Paul when Father Ryan moved there in 2002. For several years, they helped him with a meal for eight he would auction off once a year as a fundraiser for the parish school. They said cooking was one of his many hobbies. Others were fishing, photography, carpentry and gardening.
Father Ryan grew up in south Minneapolis and belonged to Incarnation. He later attended Nazareth Hall preparatory school in Roseville before enrolling in the Catholic University of Louvain in Belgium. After that, he went to Rome for two years to complete his doctoral studies. He used that education while serving on the faculty of The St. Paul Seminary from 1964 to 1976.
His first assignment after ordination in 1958 was at St. Agnes in St. Paul, from 1958 to 1964. Other parish assignments were at Transfiguration in Oakdale (1976 to –1981) and St. Charles in Bayport (1988-1999). He also served twice in Venezuela, from 1994 to 1998, and again from 1999 to 2002.
“Father always spoke about the people (of Venezuela) and his love for the people, his concern for the people,” Sharon said.
That’s why Father Ryan decided to return for a second assignment in the poverty-stricken country. He wanted to help build a church for the parish of Jesucristo Resucitado, a mission outreach of the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis. The church was completed and dedicated in 2002. Father Ryan helped with fundraising and oversaw the construction. He also worked with government officials to keep the project going. The church features a few personal touches by Father Ryan.
“He had Celtic crosses put in the church,” Sharon said. “He said, ‘They’ll know that there was an Irishman there.’ He also had three bells that he purchased. And he said, ‘“The Ryans will be calling people to church for a long time.’ Inscribed in these bells were his mother’s name (Ligouria), his father’s name (Edward) and his sister’s name (Mary).”
After retiring from active ministry in 2008, Father Ryan went to live at a lake cabin he helped build in Wisconsin, with the Bowens coming frequently to visit. He had a flourishing garden, Sharon said, and he often would drop off potatoes and other vegetables at their home, which he transported in the trunk of his car.
During this time, he became known in the Diocese of Superior in Wisconsin as the “traveling priest,” Sharon said, as he routinely celebrated Masses in rural parishes of Polk County. She was not surprised that he continued to stay active in ministry, based on what he had told her years earlier, shortly after he returned from his second stint in Venezuela.
“I said, ‘Father, are you going to retire?’” she said. “He looked at me with a look I’ll never forget. And he said, ‘Sharon, I will be an instrument in God’s hands until I can’t anymore.’”
In later years, Father Ryan lived at the Leo C. Byrne Residence for retired priests in St. Paul. Michael and Sharon would regularly pick him up and take him to his cabin. They noted that he always loved dogs and once tried to sneak a dog into the Byrne Residence. Of course, staff found out and reminded him that no dogs were allowed. So, he simply befriended a dog owned by a neighbor near his cabin. Whenever Father Ryan came to the cabin, the dog would come over and sit with him, Sharon said.
Another favorite “animal” was a stuffed tiger given to Father Ryan as a gift by the people in Venezuela as a token of their appreciation for his ministry there. “It’s a white tiger with blue eyes and they’re very rare,” Sharon said.
It was a gift of great significance, she said, as it was meant to express that Father Ryan was “a rare gem.”
The funeral Mass for Father Ryan is 10 a.m. July 23 at St. Rose of Lima, with a visitation at 9 a.m. Interment will be at Resurrection Cemetery in Mendota Heights.
