REV. WILLIAM G. CONDON, C.S.C.
June 30, 1934-July 3, 2016
NOTRE DAME, Ind. Rev. William G. Condon, C.S.C., 82, died at Our Lady of Fatima House, Notre Dame, Ind. on Sunday, July 3, 2016.
He was born on June 30, 1934, to William and Helen (Murphy) Condon in Boston, Mass. He was received into the Congregation of Holy Cross on Aug. 15, 1954. Fr. Condon professed his First Vows on Aug. 16, 1955. He earned a bachelor’s degree from Stonehill College in 1952, a master’s from Holy Cross College, Washington, D.C., in 1961, and was ordained to the priesthood on June 1, 1961.
Fr. Condon served as Tiroc Pastorale at Notre Dame High School in Bridgeport, CT from 1961 to 1962 and then as instructor at the same from 1962 to 1965, while also completing a master’s degree in political science at Catholic University in 1965. From 1965 to 1969, Fr. Condon served as an instructor at St. Peter H.S., Gloucester, MA, and also served on the Provincial Council from 1966 to 1969. From 1969 to 1970, Fr. Condon was Assistant Dean at King’s College in Wilkes-Barre, PA. In 1970 he was principal of Notre Dame High School in Bridgeport, CT, until 1973. From the fall of 1974 to 1984, Fr. Condon served as a military chaplain, while also obtaining a Ph.D. in psychology from the University of Humanistic Studies in San Diego, CA, in 1984. From August 1984 to the spring of 1985, Fr. Condon served at St. Mary Parish in Tampa, FL, before again serving as a chaplain in the military, U.S. Navy branch, from the summer of 1985 to the summer of 1990, after which he served as VP of Student Affairs at King’s College. In 1995, Fr. Condon shifted from the east to west coast, serving as National Director of Family Theater in Hollywood, CA, until 1996, when he returned back east to head up the renewal program at St. Luke Institute in Silver Springs, MD. In 1997, he returned to Connecticut, this time as a psychotherapist in Brooklyn, CT, for their prison release program. In late 1997, Fr. Condon became chaplain at Rose Hawthorne Home, where he remained until 2002. From late 2002 to August 2004, he assisted at St. Joseph Hall, North Dartmouth, MA, then served as chaplain at Nativity Prep School in New Bedford, MA until 2006. From 2006 to 2010, Fr. Condon was assistant superior in North Dartmouth and also an auxiliary priest in the Fall River Diocese from 2003 to 2016.
Preceding him in death are his parents, William and Helen Condon.
Surviving are brothers James Condon and Richard (Linda) Condon.
Visitation will be from 7:00 to 9:00 p.m. Monday (July 11, 2016) at the Chapel of Mary, Stonehill College, Easton, MA with a Wake Service at 7:30 p.m. The Funeral Mass will be at 10:00 a.m. Tuesday (July 12, 2016) at the Chapel of Mary, Stonehill College, Easton, MA. Burial will follow at the Holy Cross Community Cemetery at Stonehill College.Kaniewski Funeral Home of South Bend, IN and Kane Funeral Home of Easton, MA are in charge of the arrangements.
In lieu of flowers, gifts can be made in support of the mission and ministries of the Congregation of Holy Cross via: United States Province of Priests and Brothers, Office of Development, 500 Washington Street, North Easton, MA 02356-1299 or online at donate.holycrossusa.org.
WakeEulogyby Fr. William H. Kelley, C.S.C.
Jul. 11, 2016
The time of a death, the time of a funeral are times filled with many emotions. It is a time that we are reminded that people die. It is a time that we are reminded people we know die. It is a time we are reminded that each of us is going to die.
It is a time to wonder about the mystery of death and a time to wonder about the mystery of life, because there is no answer to the mystery of life if we do not have an answer to the mystery of death.
It’s a time we come together and don’t know what to say, but just being here we say a lot.
It’s a time we tell those stories… Remember the time — and then we laugh about it.
One of the earliest times when I was in Washington and preparing for a year away from studies. Father’s Bill Condon and Al D’Alonzo came to Washington as they were the principals and assistant principals of St. Peter’s School in Gloucester, Mass., and were looking for a Chemistry teacher. Before entering the community, I had taught for several years including chemistry, biology and math in high school, so I got the job, and a good experience.
One time when chatting, I asked him how he could tell a good teacher. His answer was it started with good disciple in the classroom, so I never sent him one kid for discipline.
Several years later, in 1970, I invited Bill to speak at my first Mass, actually it was my fifth. When I met with the pastor of my home parish, four months before the first Mass, the Holy Cross Fathers had been banned in Boston, at the time of the closing of the school. When I asked the pastor about where the guitarist and folk group could stand, he told me behind the organist, but to leave the guitar at home, and be quiet. Next topic. I have a priest giving the talk and he is a dean at a college in Pennsylvania. He said okay, if he is not too wild and does not have a beard. I assured him he was not too wild and did not have a beard. Bill showed up with his pony tail, but no beard.
Bill went on to do many things and he did them well.
A month ago, there was a young priest visiting who was interested in joining the Navy. I heard Bill give the advice of maintaining contact with his friends especially the religious community. He told how he made it a point to attend every major meeting, no matter how many miles away it was.
After a 50th anniversary, he was talking about looking back, he was happy to be nearing the end of his life and service to the church. Then Pope Francis arrived on the scene and he said he wished he was beginning his service to a new church, or least a church that agreed with him.
St. Paul, while speaking about the mystery of death and the mystery of life, used the image of a tent. St Paul’s profession was a tent maker. The tent is something we use as needed and then put it in the closet when not needed. The tent comes with a lifetime guarantee. The only problem is we have no idea how many years or months or days are in that life time. So we should use each day well.
The tent became frayed at the ends. One of the wear spots was his addictions. He battled with them and won the battle in the end. Not only did he win but he turned the scars into beauty marks. He was able to help so many others because he knew all the excuses and would not let others get away with making the same excuses.
He could speak of the power of God’s love because he experienced in his own life.
Bill was well appreciated as a preacher as he expressed what he thought with little concern with what others thought of him. Jesus sent out the seventy-two to announce the kingdom of God is at hand for you and they will know they have been visited by a messenger of God. This could apply in a church, at a meal, in the casino, or in any conversation. We all knew he was there.
The tent frayed in other ways: neuropathy of the feet, heart attack, and emphysema and gluten intolerance.
One way of fraying was he was losing his filter. We all have a filter to decide what comes to the outside. Often a stroke has this effect and people who never cussed begin to cuss. Bill was quite happy with the freedom that gave him.
I experience this about a year ago when we were at a dinner hosted be a group of nuns and attended by several other guests. Somehow the issue of politics came up and one of the guest priests expressed his view of one of the candidates. Bill’s filter failed as his inmost thoughts were verbally expressed as an audible whisper. The visiting priest got up to go to the buffet table and never returned to the table.
Bill’s tent was proudly decorated with his pony tail, his tattoos, and his multicolored stockings.
Often we think we have a body with a soul attached, but the reality is we are a soul with a body attached.
Bill’s last two weeks were just perfect. He drove to Notre Dame for a retreat. He left early so he could visit his friends at King’s College in Pennsylvania and then to Notre Dame to visit friends in the area including those in our nursing home. While on retreat, he went swimming several times, had a birthday party with gluten-free cake, got into an argument in the group circle which he enjoyed to no end, went to a casino and won a couple of hundred dollars and said goodbye because he was going home early the next day, and he did. Home to his God.
Our lives are richer because Father Bill Condon has been a part of it.
We pray for Bill as he sees God face to face, where everything makes sense, and no more need for tears and he is at peace. We pray for ourselves where we do not see God face to face, and a lot of things don’t make sense and we see the world through teary eyes, may we come to share the peace that God alone can give.
Well done good and faithful servant, enter the kingdom prepared for you.
Funeral Homilyby Fr. Richard J. Segreve, C.S.C.
Jul. 12, 2016
Father Mychal Judge, OFM, FDNY Chaplain killed in the World Trade Center tragedy, had a prayer that he said during his life. It applies to Bill, me, all CSCs and you. Fr. Judge was running into the building to show his love for his friends.
Dear God: Take me where you want me to go. Have me meet who you want me to meet. Tell me what you want me to say. And keep me out of your way. Amen.
Just look at Fr. Judge’s friendship with God and what he taught us. I take this prayer to heart. I particularly put emphasis on the line “Tell me what you want me to say.”
Fr. Bill Kelly said the practical things about Fr. Bill Condon last night. Now I will try to put Fr. Bill into the context of the scriptures that we have chosen.
Bill and I are classmates. In one way or another, we have been together 63 years. How much I know about him!!! How much he knows about me!!! We truly shared our life. We built our bond of friendship. In many ways Bill and I are quite different. But, that is the way we are supposed to be. God did not create robots. I am not the type that wears multi-colored socks and sandals, nor was he the type that got a haircut every two weeks and wore black pants. But the way we looked at life and practiced the gift of our priesthood was very much the same. The way we look at life is pretty much determined by the experiences we have in life.
Bill and I started out by being assigned to teaching in High School. We spent many years in this line of work. At this point, Bill went one way and I went another. Bill went on to King’s College and I came here to Stonehill College with other happenings in between. A big part of Bill’s life was in the navy he sailed the seas, he went to many countries he saw many historical sites. He immediately fell in love with the oceans, trees, lights and travel. During all these years his life and priesthood touched many different lives. To be a true friend you have to be a friend of Christ.
I am convinced that the words of St. Paul to the Romans apply to us: “None of us lives for oneself and no one dies for oneself. For if we live for the Lord, and if we die, we die for the Lord, so then, whether we live or die, we are the Lord’s. For this is why Christ died and came to life.”
I picked the Gospel today to express my main point. It comes from the gospel of St. John. Christ says to us, “You are my friends if you do what I command you. I no longer call you slaves, because a slave does not know what his master is doing. I have called you friends, because I have told you everything I have heard from my Father” the very last sentence of this gospel speaks directly to the point “It is not you who chose me, but I who chose you and appointed you to go and bear fruit that will remain.”
I know for a fact that Bill influenced many people just go down to Dartmouth and Westport to check this truth out! Again Fr. Judge’s words “Have me meet who you want me to meet.”
Therefore at this moment, we should all pause. To pause and think of the old ancient proverb: “Remember pilgrim, there is no road.” For this author of the proverb, I have news for him. For us the road is spelled out in the scriptures. The road is made by walking with and in the context of the scriptures. The big questions in life for us are: Where are you walking to? What is the purpose of your walk? But more fundamental to all of this is the question, “Are you walking with and in the context of the scriptures? Or are we like St. Thomas speaking to Jesus, “Lord, we do not know where we are going. And Christ turns to him and says ‘Then follow me’.”
Jesus realized that he could not walk alone. Life for him and his call to us is to believe that we cannot make our human journey in life in isolation. His journey day in and day out, was always made with friends in the context of family and community life.
Because we have forgotten the links that Jesus made between the love of God and the love of neighbor, because we have tried to live them as two separate realities, we have understood the fullness of neither. Unless we re-unite them, we cannot respond to the most fundamental call of our Christian Baptism a call to live as friends in every aspect of our life. Unless we reunite them, we risk sacrificing one at the cost of the other.
As friends we all should have a real and spiritual courage to express our love for everyone. Keep in mind, love is not love until it is given away. Love is not like a ‘pocket watch’ that you pull out from the pocket when you or someone needs the time. It is like a wrist watch that is always exposed. So, Love in not love until you give it away. A song is not a song until is sung! And Bill surely liked to sing. Christ taught this truth many times by His example of being with and helping one another.
When you think about it love, deep human love does not know death. Real love says ‘Forever.’ It has no other choice. Love will always reach out to the eternal. It has to be this way because God is eternal and love is the essence of God.
Always keep in mind this truth: “A friend is someone who reaches for your hand, but touches your heart.” Thanks, Bill for reaching out to us.
