Local priests have close connections to Archbishop Dolan

Archbishop Timothy M. Dolan of Milwaukee ordains then-seminarian Jonathan Meyer as a transitional deacon on Oct. 9, 2002, at St. Peter’s Basilica in Rome. Archbishop Dolan had been the rector of the Pontifical North American College in Rome during the first two years of now-Father Meyer’s priestly formation there. On Feb. 23, Pope Benedict XVI appointed Archbishop Dolan to lead the Archdiocese of New York. (Submitted photo)

By Sean Gallagher

“The archbishop of the capital of the world.”

That is how Pope John Paul II once described the shepherd of the Archdiocese of New York.

That is the ministry to which Pope Benedict XVI appointed Archbishop Timothy M. Dolan of Milwaukee on Feb. 23.

In leading the Archdiocese of New York, Archbishop Dolan, 59, will potentially be the most public Church leader in the United States for the next 15 years or more.

Msgr. Mark Svarczkopf, pastor of Our Lady of the Greenwood Parish in Greenwood, remembers “Timmy Dolan” from back when they were seminarians at the Pontifical North American College in Rome in the mid-1970s.

“I can remember just always how joyful he was,” said Msgr. Svarczkopf. “He was fun and a scholar, and devoted to the Blessed Virgin Mary very much.”

That devotion was on display when Msgr. Svarczkopf and Archbishop Dolan went on pilgrimage together as seminarians to Lourdes, France.

Msgr. Svarczkopf and Archbishop Dolan also worked together at a supply store in the basement of the seminary. One of their co-workers was seminarian James Harvey of the Milwaukee archdiocese, now an archbishop and the prefect of the papal household at the Vatican.

Archbishop Dolan would go on to be ordained to the priesthood on June 19, 1976, by then-Bishop Edward T. O’Meara, an auxiliary bishop in St. Louis who would later become the archbishop of Indianapolis.

A quarter of a century after the two men had been co-workers in the seminary’s basement supply shop, Msgr. Svarczkopf and Archbishop Dolan reprised their collaboration at the seminary in Rome in 2000.

This time, then-Msgr. Dolan was the seminary’s rector and Msgr. Svarczkopf headed its sabbatical program.

Msgr. Svarczkopf had high praise for his friend’s skills in leading the Pontifical North American College.

“Tim had great leadership skills, great insight into people,” Msgr. Svarczkopf said. “… He knew all the students, everybody by name, knew all about them.”

Those students gathered monthly to hear Msgr. Dolan give conferences to help them grow in their priestly formation. Many of the conferences were collected and published in 2000 in his book Priests for the Third Millennium.

“The rector’s conferences meant something. I listened to a number of those. I can quote things, not from the book, but from him saying them,” Msgr. Svarczkopf said.

One of the seminarians who heard these inspiring presentations was Father Jonathan Meyer.

“There are many things that I look at in my own life [that were inspired by him],” said Father Meyer, administrator of St. Anne and St. Joseph parishes, both in Jennings County. “One is my desire to be fervent in my preaching and my teaching. Second, he has a great, great devotion to our Blessed Mother. You’d always see him praying his rosary.”

When then-seminarian Meyer first arrived in Rome, he knew he would potentially be away from his home and family for two years.

So he especially appreciated how Msgr. Dolan cared for him and the other seminarians.

“He was a father,” Father Meyer said. “If you were sick, he would stop by your room and check up on you. And there were 180 guys in that place.”

Father Meyer said he experienced Msgr. Dolan’s caring attitude in a special way when he learned that his father back home had lost his job.

“When [Msgr. Dolan] found out, he wrote a letter to my parents,” said Father Meyer. “It wasn’t just, ‘Hey, I’ll take care of Jonathan who is with me.’ He wrote a letter and told my parents that he was praying to St. Joseph every day for him. He’s a man of great compassion.”

Duane Meyer, Father Meyer’s father and a member of St. Lawrence Parish in Lawrenceburg, appreciated the note as much for the care it showed the seminary rector had for his seminarians as for anything else.

“It meant that he was listening to his seminarians,” Meyer said. “It [showed] his personal side and his compassion.”

In October 2002, Archbishop Dolan, who had just months earlier been installed as the leader of the Archdiocese of Milwaukee, returned to the seminary he once led to ordain a class of its seminarians as transitional deacons in St. Peter’s Basilica.

One of them was Father Meyer.

“Here was this man who roamed our halls as the rector of the seminary for two years,” Father Meyer said, “and then, on the day of your ordination, I had that same man lay his hands upon my head. It was pretty powerful.”

In 2005, Archbishop Dolan came to Msgr. Svarczkopf’s parish in Greenwood to present a “day of sanctification” to the priests of the archdiocese.

Msgr. Joseph F. Schaedel, vicar general, who had gotten to know Msgr. Dolan when he visited the North American College in the mid-1990s as the archdiocese’s vocations director, attended the day of sanctification.

“From the moment I met him, I liked him,” said Msgr. Schaedel, who also serves as pastor of Our Lady of the Most Holy Rosary Parish in Indianapolis. “He is down to earth, has a great sense of humor, but is a very holy man, and certainly a man of the Church.”

When Msgr. Dolan was appointed an auxiliary bishop in 2001 for his home archdiocese in St. Louis, Msgr. Svarczkopf gave him a gift that had been given to him by Archbishop O’Meara when he was on his deathbed in 1992—a rosary that had belonged to Archbishop Fulton J. Sheen.

Now Archbishop Dolan is heading to New York where Archbishop Sheen did much of his ministry on radio, television and as the director of the American branch of the Pontifical Society for the Propagation of the Faith.

Both Msgr. Svarczkopf and Father Meyer hope to attend the April 15 installation of their friend and mentor at St. Patrick Cathedral in New York.

For his part, Father Meyer is confident that Archbishop Dolan will do well leading the local Church in New York.

“The same Dolan that was in Milwaukee was the same Dolan that I had as a rector for two years,” Father Meyer said. “And I think he’s going to be the same Dolan in New York. He’s a man of consistency.” †