As is the case with many retired priests, retirement for Father Francis Early has not meant inactivity.

After the priest of The Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Washington officially retired as the pastor of Sacred Heart Parish in Bushwood, Maryland in 2013 after leading that parish for 19 years, he then began helping out at St. Patrick Parish in Rockville and Our Lady of Grace Parish in the Leisure World retirement community where he now lives.

In his retirement, celebrating Masses and hearing Confessions for people continues to be part of the fabric of his life, as it has been since he was ordained to the priesthood in 1985.

“Sometimes I feel I’m doing more than when I was active,” the priest said, then jokingly added, “I’ve told people that I’m going to retire from my retirement.”

During his 38 years as a priest, Father Early – who turns 87 on Oct. 23 – has served people faithfully out of the limelight, including his nearly two decades leading Sacred Heart, a country parish in St. Mary’s County in Southern Maryland. But this fall, his photo has been used to promote the archdiocese’s 2023 Retired Priests Collection, which will be taken up at parishes on the weekend of Nov. 4-5.

Reflecting on the irony of his photo being used on posters and mailings to promote the collection, the soft-spoken priest remembered something that his friend, the late Msgr. Lorenzo Albacete, said.

“Lorenzo used to say, ‘God has a sense of humor,’ and I’m proof of that!” Father Early said, laughing.

The photos promoting the Retired Priest Collection show Father Early at the June 2023 ordination of the archdiocese’s newest priests. In one photo, he is embracing newly ordained Father John Lado after vesting him at the ordination, and in the other photo, Father Early is shown laying hands on the head of the new priest, praying that the Holy Spirit will guide him in his priesthood.

After Father Early had retired and was helping celebrate Masses at St. Patrick Church in Rockville, John Lado as a high schooler was one of his altar servers. 

“He was always there early and served Mass beautifully and with great reverence… We became great friends from the beginning,” said Father Early, who noted that when the future priest was in college, he came back to the parish and served Masses with him. “I saw something there, and was not surprised when he said he was going to apply to the archdiocese as a seminarian.”

When then-Deacon Lado was studying for the priesthood in Rome, he sometimes called Father Early, and he later asked his friend to vest him at his ordination.

“That is a great honor… I was very touched,” said Father Early. “John is like my spiritual son. To lay hands on him and to have the honor of vesting him meant so much to me.”

Father Early’s own priestly calling was fostered in his childhood, when he was growing up in his native Washington, D.C., and serving as an altar server at Holy Trinity Parish in Georgetown.

“From the time I was a child, I wanted to be a priest. That’s what I wanted to be when I grew up,” he said.

The Jesuits he knew at Holy Trinity were wonderful priests, Father Early said, adding, “I always loved the liturgy.”

When he was less than a year old, his father, Walter Early, died in a car accident, and then his mother, Agnes Smith Early, went to work during World War II in the General Accounting Office to support herself and her only child.

As a young man, Francis Early began working for George Washington University, and for 16 0f his 19 years there, he was the manager of Lisner Auditorium, where he met luminaries such as the legendary mime Marcel Marceau and the ballerina Dame Margot Fonteyn.

The priesthood was out of the question then, because he was taking care of his mother as she grew older, just as she had taken care of him in his younger years.

His friend Lorenzo Albacete, who worked in aerospace research before being ordained as a priest, told him, “If you think God is calling you to serve Him, you answer in the way that is open to you.”

Following that advice, Francis Early was ordained as a permanent deacon for the archdiocese in 1972, and served in that role for 13 years at the Cathedral of St. Matthew the Apostle, where his experiences included assisting at Saint John Paul II’s Mass at the cathedral during the pope’s 1979 visit to Washington.

After his mother died in 1983, Deacon Early was encouraged by the cathedral’s rector, Msgr. W. Louis Quinn, and Washington’s then-Archbishop James Hickey, to follow his dream of becoming a priest. In 1985, Father Francis Early was ordained as a priest for the archdiocese, after studying at St. Joseph’s Seminary and Oblate College, and he celebrated his first Mass at St. Matthew’s Cathedral where he had served for many years as a deacon.

On his 25^th anniversary as a priest in 2010, Father Early reflected on how his vocation as a theater manager was followed by his vocation to the priesthood.

“I said, ‘I’ve been blessed by God. For 19 years, I made a living doing something I loved… I loved theater. (Now) I’m being called to a greater love… serving the Lord and His people.”

After his ordination to the priesthood, Father Early served as a parochial vicar at the Church of the Little Flower from 1985 to 1994, before being named as pastor of Sacred Heart Parish in Bushwood.

Sacred Heart Church, which is known as “the little cathedral in the pines,” became a special home for the priest over the years, and the parishioners there became his family. Generations of families there have had their sons serve as altar servers in that church, and family members have pitched in at the parish’s spring dinner featuring fried chicken, country ham and crabcakes, and its fall dinner featuring roast turkey, stuffed ham and fried oysters.

When he was pastor at the Bushwood parish, Father Early said, “I feel like I’m part of every family here. You feel close to the people, and they feel close to you.”

A plaque in the church’s vestibule lists Father Early’s name, along with every other pastor who has served there since Sacred Heart Parish was founded in 1755.

In his retirement, Father Early has kept in touch with his friends at Sacred Heart, through phone calls and occasional visits, and he has returned there to celebrate weddings and to preside at Funeral Masses for parishioners, including a funeral there for a husband who was skilled in carpentry and had done many repairs at the church, and for that man’s wife who faithfully cleaned the church over the years.

“I had to do their funerals, they did so much for me,” Father Early said of those parishioners. “…It (Sacred Heart) is my family, really.”

On Saturdays at St. Patrick Church in Rockville, Father Early helps hear Confessions of people lining up there for that sacrament. He also serves as the chaplain of the Leisure Club for retired Catholics in St. Patrick’s, Our Lady of Grace and the nearby Shrine of St. Jude in Rockville. Not surprisingly, he has joined the Leisure Club a couple of times for a bus ride to Sacred Heart Church in Bushwood, to enjoy the parish dinners there.

When he doesn’t have a parish Mass to celebrate, Father Early celebrates a Mass by himself at his home in Leisure World.

“Every Mass that I say fills my heart with joy and awe and love for Christ and (for) what He’s done for me and to me,” the priest said. “…It’s awesome, it’s unbelievable. (I was) just a little kid from Georgetown who wanted to be a priest.”

Retired Priests Collection at parishes slated for Nov. 4-5

On the weekend of Nov. 4-5, the 2023 Retired Priests Collection will be taken up at parishes across The Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Washington.

Of the archdiocese’s 277 priests, 59 of them are retired. After providing decades of service to people, bringing them the sacraments at all stages of their lives, most of those priests continue to serve people at parishes in the archdiocese.

Father Anthony Lickteig, the Episcopal Vicar for Clergy and Secretary for Ministerial Leadership for the Archdiocese of Washington, noted that “most retired priests help out at parishes with daily and Sunday Mass, especially when the pastor is on vacation or on his off day. In addition, a few assist at Arlington National Cemetery and other specialized ministries.”

“The Retired Priests Collection helps provide financial support to all of our retired priests,” Father Lickteig said. “It is a way to say ‘thank you’ for the many years of active service they have provided to so many throughout their priesthood, and helps them live their retirement in dignity.”

Local Catholics who would like to support the Retired Priests Collection can use envelopes provided in pews at their parishes on Nov. 4-5. Here are other ways to support the collection:

• Call (301) 853-4486 to make a gift with a credit or debit card or bank information.
• People can also text “Priest” to (301) 231-1816, and they will receive a text message to complete their gift.
• To make a gift online, people can go to adw.org/rpc or use their phone camera to scan the QR code