‘I never went reluctantly’: The enthusiastic and impactful priesthood of 101-year-old Msgr. Turro
Pope Francis, a proponent of homiletic brevity, would like Msgr. James Turro and his homilies: they are famously short and memorable. Sometimes four to six sentences in length. One minute, maybe two in duration.
“I fought against making the pulpit a classroom. I wanted it to be more of a conversation, though one-sided,” Msgr. Turro told NJ.com in a 2022 interview.
It is ironic, then, that a man renowned for his sparsity of words has a library named after him – Seton Hall University’s Turro Seminary Library. Built in the 1860s, it was renamed in his honor in 2007 after spending 45 years as director there. But such is his ability throughout his priesthood to make a little go a long way. Not just in his homilies, but how his presence has stayed with those who have encountered him – from seminarians in the classroom to parishioners in the pews.
Msgr. Turro celebrated his 101st birthday on Jan. 26. He is the oldest and longest-serving priest in the Archdiocese of Newark, born in 1922 and ordained in 1948 at St. Patrick’s Pro-Cathedral in Newark before the construction of the Cathedral Basilica of the Sacred Heart was completed.
Turro as a Teacher
If you ask priests in the Archdiocese of Newark about Msgr. Turro, most will say they know of him. Many others will say they had him as a teacher.
After receiving a licentiate in theology from the Catholic University of America and studying for two years in Rome, Msgr. Turro began teaching at Immaculate Conception Seminary/ Seton Hall in 1959 where he remained on staff for 60 years. He also served as a retreat master, providing spiritual guidance to thousands of priests, religious men and women, and laity.
In a 2014 award recognizing Msgr. Turro’s impact at the seminary, Msgr. Joseph Reilly, then dean of the School of Theology, called Msgr. Turro “an amazing person.”
“He teaches scripture, but he also teaches how to be a person of faith – not just by the way he teaches a class, but by the way he lives his life. He teaches how many generations of men what it means to be a priest: a faithful and generous man of service,” Msgr. Joseph Reilly said.
A significant aspect of his legacy at Immaculate Conception Seminary and Seton Hall University is his tenure as the director of the seminary library now named after him. “No one held that title so long and amid so much trial and turmoil as did Msgr. Turro,” read the dedication. “In the upheaval of the post-Vatican II years, he served as a sure refuge for seminarians buffeted by the revolutionary-like winds blowing through both church and seminary.”
In the calmness of his later years, Msgr. Turro now resides at Our Lady of Mercy Church in Park Ridge as priest-in-residence, where he had previously served as a weekend assistant for more than 50 years.
Reflecting on his own teaching career with Jersey Catholic recently, he is understated in his assessment, simply saying that he “never went to the classroom reluctantly.”
“I went always eagerly and happily to communicate something that I felt was of value and facing people who needed to know what I had to share,” he said.
The seminary was not his first stop as a teacher. With a smile, he recalled that his early years as a priest were also his first years as an educator.
“I was two years in a parish in Hackensack (Holy Trinity, 1949-50) which had a thriving high school. That’s how I got my start teaching and that’s how I got to fall in love with teaching,” he said.
And this love has not faded over 70 years. Even after retiring to his church in Park Ridge, the parish’s lively K-8 academy ensures that his role as a teacher of young minds does not stop. Until recently, he even hosted “Tuesdays with Turro,” where one day a week he would teach religious education and prepare children for First Communion and Reconciliation.
“‘Let not thy learning exceed thy deeds. Mere knowledge is not the goal but action.’ Wise words taken from the Talmud saying something that is strong and necessary for us. Let it not be said of us as, I believe, it can be said of others: vox, vox et praeterea nihil: words, words and nothing else.” – Turro, Reflections: Path to Prayer (1972)
Turro as a Pastor
Mary Butler has been a parishioner at Our Lady of Mercy since she was eight years old and has known Msgr. Turro most of her life. She remembers as a child looking forward to every Mass he celebrated because of his brief homilies.
“He would have the shortest homily – literally a sentence – but you knew to pay attention when he was saying Mass because his one sentence was so powerful that you were going to get a message that would truthfully change your life,” Butler said.
For Butler, now a second-grade teacher at Our Lady of Mercy Academy, that’s not hyperbole. Msgr. Turro and his timely words guided her through great changes in her life. He was the priest who married Butler and her husband. He was also with her as she buried both her parents.
She recalls the devastating loss of her mother and the one sentence from Msgr. Turro that she holds closest to her heart.
“I really struggled with my mom dying,” Butler said. “I went to him, and I was just beside myself. That was when he said, ‘You can tell how much God loves you by the people He puts in your life.’ I could see God’s love because He put her in my life.”
Msgr. Turro is measured with his words – rarely repeating himself. But the one thing he reinforces is his approach to the vocation of the priesthood, repeating similar phrases: “I never went reluctantly”; “I never had to drag myself”; “It was never a drudgery for me, but a privilege.”
And when asked for his advice to seminarians and young priests starting in the priesthood, Msgr. Turro expounded on his enthusiastic pastoral approach.
“Enjoy it to the utmost. Someone might say, ‘Just do it as a job, an eight-hour a day thing.’ No – it’s an incredible experience.”
Being a priest was never an impersonal experience for Msgr. Turro. He learned this when he was very young. As a first grader at St. Paul the Cross Grammar School in Jersey City, Turro met a newly ordained priest from that parish. The young priest approached each student and gave them his first blessing and a holy card from the ordination. Turro kept that card with him for many years.
More than 30 years following that day, Msgr. Turro began working as a weekend assistant at Our Lady of Mercy, whose pastor was that same young priest who had bestowed his first blessing and given his holy card to an eager first grader named James Turro.
Msgr. Turro receiving the Gifts at Mass (Our Lady of Mercy Church)
“God is aware of each one of us as individuals with all our exciting distinctiveness and not as mere blurs in the vast crowd of humanity. Surely this was the way Christ related to people during his time on earth. When he was asked to heal the man who was deaf and dumb he did not content himself to effect the cure by a mere flick of His will; as it were, with detachment. Instead he insisted on the personal touch. He put his fingers into the man’s ears and touched his tongue.” – Turro, Reflections: Path to Prayer (1972).
Turro in His Own Words
On how to craft a good, brief homily:
And an example of one of his homilies – from Easter Sunday, 2020:
Scroll below for more reflections from Msgr. Turro’s book Reflections: Path to Prayer (1972):
Featured image: Msgr. James Turro at Cardinal Tobin’s installation. Photo/OSV
