Note: This is an update of a previous story about the death of Father Frederick Meyer.
Richard Rohlfing thought nothing of driving an hour and a half from his home to the funeral of Father Frederick Meyer Aug. 14 at St. Agnes in St. Paul. Father Meyer, who was a priest for 68 years, died Aug. 1 at age 93.
Rohlfing wanted to say farewell to a priest he met in 1974 when he served Mass shortly after Father Meyer’s arrival at Nativity in Cleveland, where he served for 18 years. Rohlfing became “quite loyal” to Father Meyer and followed him in 1992 to his next assignment at St. Henry in St. Henry. Father Meyer served there for 13 years, with Rohlfing in the pews for Mass throughout that time and taking numerous photos of the priest at various Masses and events.
“He was a big influence on me,” said Rohlfing, who is married and has a 14-year-old daughter. “I went to his last Mass at St. Henry, his going-away Mass. One of the things he said, which still sticks with me, is ‘If I have offended anybody here, I hope you forgive me. And if any of you have offended me, know that I forgive you, too.’”
A native of St. Paul ordained in 1956, Father Meyer ministered at nine parishes in urban and rural areas of the archdiocese before retiring from active ministry in 2005. He was pastor of St. Henry in St. Henry for 13 years (1992-2005), and Nativity in Cleveland for 18 years (1974-1992). He served for 15 years as parochial administrator of Immaculate Conception in Marysburg (1977-1992).
Father Meyer began his priestly ministry as assistant priest of St. Mary in St. Paul (1956-1958), Our Lady of Victory in Minneapolis (1958-1961) and St. Vincent de Paul in St. Paul (1961-1963). He was parochial administrator of St. Vincent (1963-1967) and assistant priest of Corpus Christi (1967-1968) and St. Agnes (1968-1969), all in St. Paul, before his appointment as parochial administrator of St. Agnes (1969-1972) and assistant priest of St. Anne in Minneapolis (1972-1974).
Father Meyer, the oldest of four, always insisted on being called “Father Fred,” said his niece, Dr. Vicki Oster, who regularly spent time with him over the years, including his last six at the Little Sisters of the Poor’s Holy Family Residence in St. Paul.
“He was just a man of deep faith, and he really liked the simple things,” said Oster, 59. “He loved to be outside in nature. … Starting, I think in the seminary, he said he always made it a point to take a walk every single day to get outside in nature.”
“He loved simple things like that,” she said. “He never had a TV. He listened to the radio.”
Father James Reidy, one of only two members of Father Meyer’s 1956 ordination class of 18 who is still living, said he was a “very kind man.” Father Reidy was able to attend the funeral Mass at St. Agnes, where Father Meyer served during his earlier years of ministry. The homilist for the Mass, Father Ken O’Hotto, noted Father Meyer’s 49 years of active ministry, and said at one point he served at a parish in the Le Sueur area near where Father Meyer was serving.
“Father Fred loved being a priest,” said Father O’Hotto, who has been a priest for 44 years. “He was a kind man, a good priest, a man of faith, a priest who loved to celebrate the Mass, to celebrate the holy Eucharist.”
Steve Dembouski was another altar server who served alongside Father Meyer at Mass, starting in 1979 and continuing for nine years at Immaculate Conception in Marysburg.
“I really appreciate the way he (celebrated) his Masses,” said Dembouski, 54. “He always said I wasn’t serving for him, I was serving with him because it was for God.”
When Father Meyer retired in 2005, Dembouski and his wife, Lisa, helped him with various tasks at his apartment in Le Sueur and later helped him with legal and health care matters. They helped him move to St. Paul and the Little Sisters’ Holy Family Residence six years ago and continued to help with his care.
“He was so gentle and sweet,” said Lisa Dembouski, 55. “Now, he didn’t always come across that way to people. You had to get to know him for a little while. But, once you knew him and you understood him, he was just like a little teddy bear.”
Like her husband, Lisa knew Father Meyer while she was growing up. He baptized her youngest sister, who later became a Carmelite nun. Lisa credits Father Meyer with helping facilitate that vocational calling. Father Meyer, who grew up in St. Paul, also baptized all five of the Dembouskis’ children. Today, Steve and Lisa attend Sts. Peter and Paul in Mankato (Diocese of Winona-Rochester).
Over years of spending time with Father Meyer, who also was close friends with Lisa’s father, they noticed one unusual aspect of his behavior.
“Whenever we would (leave), he never wanted to tell my wife goodbye,” Steve recalled. “It would always be, ‘Keep the faith.’ Never wanted to say goodbye because that meant he might not see you again.”
Geri and Jim Korman will forever cherish a gift they received from Father Meyer on their wedding day in 1987. Jim, the priest’s nephew, and Geri asked him to be a concelebrant at their wedding Mass at St. Patrick in Inver Grove Heights. At the reception, Father Meyer handed them a present: “the most beautiful crucifix,” Geri said. “And that crucifix… through the whole 37 years, (has) hung on our wall.”
“Every time you look at that crucifix, you’re thinking of Father Fred,” she said. “We’ll always have that (crucifix) in our family and we’ll pass that down to our kids someday.”
Geri Korman participates in the Seven Sisters Apostolate, a local ministry that offers Holy Hours for specific priests every day of the week. In 2019, a member of the group, Deb Thielen of St. Michael in Stillwater, began making quilts for retired priests with the goal of making one for each retired priest in the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis.
During the annual retreat in 2022, which took place at St. Elizabeth Ann Seton in Hastings, Geri Korman noticed a striking quilt displayed on a table, a quilt made by Thielen’s sister as part of a ministry called “Appreciated and Loved.”
“It drew me in, this quilt, and I had to go look at it,” said Korman, who belongs to a Seven Sisters Apostolate group at her parish, St. Therese in Deephaven. “And unbeknownst to me, here was Father Fred’s name and ordination date. It was for him.”
She added: “I was so grateful that he was getting this quilt because he certainly deserved that for all the years of his beautiful service and vocation. We’re so grateful for his vocation to serve the Lord.”
