Father Peter Alliata, a priest of The Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Washington for more than 60 years, died Feb. 23 in Cottage City, Maryland. He was 87 years old.
Retired since 2010, Father Alliata told the Catholic Standard in a 2021 interview about his six decades as a priest that the greatest blessing of his priesthood had been “the love of the community back and forth. You really got to meet people, being part of their lives.”
“I really enjoyed being with the people. That’s what it was all about,” he said in that interview.
Born April 26, 1935 in Washington, D.C., he was one of three children of the late Peter and Katherine Alliata, who were both immigrants. The future priest was baptized at Holy Rosary, the Italian parish in Washington, and later attended Saint Joseph’s Home and School and Saint Martin’s School in Washington.
After he graduated from the eighth grade at Saint Martin’s, the pastor there, Msgr. Louis Miltenberger, encouraged him to enter the seminary. After attending Saint Charles College in Catonsville and Saint Mary’s Seminary in Baltimore, Father Alliata was ordained as a priest of The Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Washington on May 27, 1961 at Saint Matthew’s Cathedral by then-Archbishop Patrick O’Boyle.
For his first five years as a priest, he served as a parochial vicar at St. Matthias Parish in Lanham, then as an associate pastor at two Washington parishes, Assumption and St. Joseph on Capitol Hill. Those first years of his priesthood coincided with the Second Vatican Council, and then the changes that it brought about, including Mass being celebrated in English and other local languages instead of Latin, and growing participation of the laity at Mass and in parish life.
“I liked the change,” Father Alliata said in his 2021 interview with the Catholic Standard. “You just had more of a feeling of contact with the people out there.”
He was appointed in 1969 as an associate pastor at Sacred Heart Parish in Bowie, where he served for two years before serving in that role from 1971-74 at St. Nicholas in Laurel.
In 1974, Father Alliata was named as the pastor of Holy Angels in Avenue. In 1979, the priest was appointed to study the possibility of establishing a new parish in the St. Charles City area of Charles County, and in 1980, Father Alliata became the founding pastor of Our Lady Help of Christians Parish in Waldorf, where he served until 1987.
He served as the pastor of St. James Parish in Mount Rainier from 1987 to 2004; and then was named the pastor of Immaculate Conception in Mechanicsville, where he served until his 2010 retirement.
Over the years, Father Alliata was very involved as a priest participating in weekend retreats for Worldwide Marriage Encounter and the Cursillo Movement. Upon retirement, Father Alliata was appointed to the Priest Retirement Board from 2011-2014 and was also appointed administrator pro tempore of Saint John Vianney Parish, Prince Frederick, Maryland for two months in 2011.
A Vigil for Father Alliata will be held on Monday, March 6, at Saint James Church, Mount Rainer, Maryland from 3 p.m. to 7p.m. with the Vigil Mass at 7:30 p.m. Washington Cardinal Wilton Gregory will celebrate a Mass of Christian Burial at Saint James Church on Tuesday, March 7, 2023 at 10 a.m. Interment will follow at Mount Olivet Cemetery, Washington, D.C.
