Fr. Wiederholt to note 65th priestly anniversary

Being a priest is a blessing far beyond anything words can express.”

Father Clarence Wiederholt

It was after 10 p.m. when the doorbell rang at St. Pius X Rectory in Moberly.

Father Clarence Wiederholt, recently ordained, answered the door.

The woman on the porch spoke desperately about a visit she had just received.

She lived a few blocks away from church and worked at home.

Two nights in a row, she put up a sign on her door saying she was sick and wasn’t accepting customers.

Twice, a man dressed in white ignored the sign and stood at the foot of her bed.

The second time, he told her to go to the nearest Catholic church.

She entered St. Pius X Church, and immediately noticed the image of Christ above the high altar.

“She said it was the same man who had stood over her bed,” Fr. Wiederholt recalled.

The woman wanted to start learning right away about what Catholics believe.

The priest sent her home with a copy of the Baltimore Catechism and began giving her instructions the next day.

When she was ready, he set a date to administer the sacraments of initiation and welcome her into the Church.

That’s when the pastor, Monsignor John Mahoney, now deceased, realized where she had come from.

“You see, Moberly was a big railroad town,” Fr. Wiederholt explained. “There was a big turnaround for the trains, and you had railroad workers coming and going all the time.

“And down on that one street, just a block long, there were a lot of houses where some of the men would go and not stay for very long,” he said.

The next several Sundays, Msgr. Mahoney let people know from the pulpit that a new parishioner would be joining them and that in case anyone recognized her, she had turned over a new leaf.

“She was my first convert,” said Fr. Wiederholt. “The Lord took care of her and brought her into the Church in such a beautiful way. All I had to do was believe her and give her instructions.”

That is one of many stories Fr. Wiederholt, now retired, has come to treasure in his heart since his priestly ordination on Dec. 21, 1955.

In nearly 65 years of Priesthood, he has served in parishes throughout the diocese and at U.S. Air Force installations on several continents, and now in offering up prayers for people who need them.

“Then and Now”

Fr. Wiederholt was the youngest priest of the old St. Joseph diocese when Bishop (later Cardinal) John P. Cody ordained him, and he became the youngest priest of the Jefferson City diocese upon its creation a few months later.

Now within weeks of his 90th birthday, he is blessed with more seniority than all but one of his fellow priests of this diocese.

He is one of only two who were serving here when Venerable Pope Pius XII created the diocese in 1956.

He recently set up a little display in his apartment in Jefferson City.

Titled “Then and Now,” it includes a photo of him at his ordination and a current photo, separated by a statue of the Holy Family — Jesus, Mary and Joseph.

The Holy Family has been Fr. Wiederholt’s spiritual inspiration since his freshman year in high school.

Born and raised near Conception Abbey in northeastern Missouri, he started to sense a priestly calling at age 7 and entered the seminary at Conception Abbey after eighth grade.

He continued there for 12 years.

Bishop Cody became bishop of the old St. Joseph diocese, which spanned all of northern Missouri, in 1955.

He decided to have three of his seminarians, including Fr. Wiederholt, take an extra semester of theology over the summer so he could ordain them six months early.

On Dec. 21, 1955, in St. Patrick Church in Maryville, Bishop Cody ordained Fr. Wiederholt to the Holy Priesthood.

The new priest offered his first parish Mass at midnight on Christmas at the St. Benedict mission in Burlington Junction, after hearing his first confessions there.

One of his brothers was a parishioner there, so he got to spend his first Christmas as a priest catching up with old friends.

He and Msgr. Mahoney were assigned to Moberly around the same time.

Shortly before that, Bishop Cody’s predecessor, the late Bishop Charles H. LeBlond of St. Joseph, had combined the German and Irish Catholic parishes in that city into one and named it in honor of a beloved, recently sainted Pope.

Fr. Wiederholt then served as assistant pastor at St. Lawrence parish in St. Elizabeth, then at St. Patrick parish in Rolla before volunteering to serve as an Air Force chaplain.

His assignments, some rather adventuresome, included five Cold War surveillance stations in deeply isolated parts of Alaska.

He credits prayer and God’s desire for him to continue his ministry with saving his life on several occasions during dangerous deployments.

Upon returning to civilian life, he served as pastor of what is now known as Church of the Risen Savior parish in Rhineland; St. Patrick parish in Gravois Mills (now in Laurie) and the St. Philip Benizi mission in Versailles; of St. Mary of the Angels parish in Wien; St. Clement parish in St. Clement; St. Joseph parish in Edina and the St. Aloysius mission in Baring; St. Anthony of Padua parish in St. Anthony and finally Our Lady of the Snows parish in Mary’s Home.

Keeping up

One time during that last pastorate, he was making his rounds at Capital Region Medical Center in Jefferson City.

After giving his last parishioner Holy Communion, he noticed a man in a brown suit, standing nearby.

With urgency, the man told the priest to follow him.

“Regardless of how fast I walked, he stayed quite a distance in front of me as we went from hallway to hallway,” Fr. Wiederholt recalled.

After following the man down a long highway, the priest lost sight of him but heard him say, “She is in there.”

Fr. Wiederholt turned to thank the man but he was nowhere in sight.

When the woman in the hospital room saw the priest, she started to cry.

“Between her tears, she told me that her children had fallen away from the Church,” said Fr. Wiederholt. “They would not listen to her pleas to get her a priest.”

He told her that a priest was there with her.

He heard her confession and administered the Sacrament of Anointing of the Sick.

The next morning after Mass, he returned to bring her Holy Communion, but she had died during the night.

“She did not receive Jesus from me that day,” he said. “Instead, Jesus received her into heaven.”

Only then did Fr. Wiederholt realize that he never actually caught sight of the man’s face.

He is convinced it was St. Joseph, foster father of Jesus and patron saint of a happy death.

“I’ve heard stories of him seeking out a priest for people who are dying,” said Fr. Wiederholt. “I believe I could no longer see him because his job was done and his spirit went back to heaven.”

“Wonderful things”

Fr. Wiederholt retired from active ministry in 2008.

He moved to Jefferson City and served for a time as volunteer chaplain at the Carmelite Monastery and as sacramental minister of St. Michael parish in Russellville.

He continued helping out as long as he could at Cathedral of St. Joseph parish and other parishes in the diocese.

He has lost much of his eyesight but is grateful for the memories of all he saw and experienced in active Priesthood.

“Being a priest is a blessing far beyond anything words can express,” he said. “The wonderful things that I have seen happen through my ministry —  the sacraments, the various miracles I’ve been able to be a part of by inviting people to put their faith in God — it’s very humbling.”

He still stands in awe that God would choose him to minister at His altar.

“I treasure the fact that the Lord has stuck with me and His calling,” he said. “How I’d love to go back and do it all again!”