Father Daly Rememvered As

Quiet and Well-Liked

A Mass of Christian Burial for Father Joseph F. Daly, a retired priest of the Diocese of Brooklyn, was celebrated Thursday, March 8, at St. Margaret’s Church, Middle Village. He died March 4 at PArkway Hospital, Forest Hills. For the past eight years, he had resided at Ozanam Hall, Bayside. He would have been 91 on March 31.

Born in Brooklyn, Father Daly attended Cathedral Prep, St. Francis College, and Immaculate Conception

Father Daly

Seminary, Huntington. He was ordained May 30, 1942 by Bishop Thomas E. Molloy at St. James Pro-Cathedral, Downtown Brooklyn.

He served as an assistant at Holy Innocents, Flatbush, 1942-43; St. Martin of Tours, Bushwick, 1943-44; St. Teresa, Sterling Pl., 1944-60; Queen of Peace, Kew Gardens, 1960-74; and St. Margaret, Middle Village, 1974-87.

In 1987, he retired.

Retired Bishop Thomas V. Daily was the main celebrant of the funeral Mass. Special concelebrants included Msgr. Walter Murphy and Father William Dulaney, who also preached the homily.

Father Daly was always very close to his family, recalls his niece Elizabeth Lumley of Flushing. Her father and Father Daly were brothers. She was a little child when he was a seminarian and remembers that he worked at Steeplechase in Coney Island during the summers then.
He was often over to their house for dinner and would give her a ride on an old-fashioned carpet sweeper. When he tired of the game he joked, “You’re getting too fat,” and they had a good laugh.

Father Daly baptized all of Lumley’s children and married her son and his wife at Mary’s Nativity Church, Flushing. He was very good to her children and brought them books because he “was very concerned about learning.” When he came to dinner, he was always very proper, wearing his Roman collar. Lumley’s little daughter asked her mother, “Are priests born with that collar?” When she told her uncle, he laughed so hard and on the next visit wore a sport shirt.

Lumley said her uncle was “very thoughtful,” a “quiet man” and “well-liked.”

In later years Father Daly’s health failed, she said, but “he knew me to the end.”

Burial was in St. John’s Cemetery, Middle Village.
In addition to Mrs. Lumley, survivors include seven grand nephews and nieces.

Father Grant Became a Priest

After Being a Banker

A Mass of Christian Burial for Father Matthew M. Grant, 76, former pastor of St. Patrick’s, Long Island City, was celebrated March 2 at St. Thomas More Church, Breezy Point. He died Feb. 27 at Clove Lake Nursing Home, S.I.

Born in Brooklyn, he was baptized at St. Patrick’s Church, Kent. Ave. He attended St. John’s University, and Mount St. Mary Seminary, Emmittsburg, Md. He was ordained May 30, 1964, by Bishop Bryan J.

Father Matthew Grant

McEntegart at St. James Pro-Cathedral, Brooklyn.

He served as an assistant at Our Lady of Lourdes, Bushwick, 1964; Our Lady of Victory, Bedford-Stuyvesant, 1964-65; Our Lady of Solace, Coney Island, 1965-69; Christ the King, Springfield Gardens, 1969-71; St. Nicholas, Williamsburg, 1971-72; and St. Michael, Fourth Ave., 1972-80.

He was administrator of St. Boniface, Downtown Brooklyn, 1980-90, and pastor of St. Patrick, 1990-94.
He also served as a member of the diocesan Budget Review Committee, 1983-88.

Auxiliary Bishop Guy Sansaricq was the main celebrant of the funeral Mass. Special concelebrants included Msgrs. George Zatarga, James Cooney, Walter Simons, and Father Michael R. Parisi. Msgr. John Brown preached the homily.

Msgr. Brown, pastor of St. Francis de Sales, Belle Harbor, had known Father Grant since he was 14 years old and Father Grant was pastor of his parish, St. Michael’s on Fourth Ave.

Honest and Upfront

“He made the priesthood seem very real,” Msgr. Brown said and continued to be “very supportive” as Msgr. Brown went on to the priesthood.

“He was honest and upfront,” continued Msgr. Brown. “He showed me that God calls different types of people to the priesthood, that there is no cookie cutter version of a priest.”

Father Grant had a great devotion to anyone in need and especially to the poor, Msgr. Brown said.
His one outside interest or hobby was the stock exchange.
“Perhaps because he was a banker before becoming a priest,” said Msgr. Brown, who noted that friends had observed “Father Grant had died on the day that the stock exchange took a nosedive.”

Father Grant was a veteran of the Korean War and that experience was key to his vocation to the priesthood. It was Father Grant’s duty to go ahead of the artillery to scout positions. After a night of the artillery firing on the enemy, Father Grant would walk around the battlefield among all the enemy bodies and pray for them. He shared this with Msgr. Brown after the younger man was himself a priest.

“He had a gruff exterior, but he was very soft inside,” Msgr. Brown recalls. “He was open to Christ in his life and saw Christ in all different experiences.”

Father Grant is survived by nieces and nephews, who reside in Breezy Point. Burial was in St. John’s Cemetery, Middle Village.

Obituaries

Brother Francis Mullan, SMM, a Marianist brother for almost 60 years and former teacher at Chaminade College Preparatory, Mineola, died Feb. 21, in Dayton, Ohio. He was 78.

Brother Francis was born in Brooklyn, and attended St. Clement Pope School, South Ozone Park, and Brooklyn Tech before entering the novitiate at Beacon, N.Y., in

Brother Francis

1947. He professed first vows in 1948 and final vows in 1952.

He graduated from the University of Dayton in 1951 and received a master’s degree in mathematics from St. John’s University, Jamaica, in 1960.

In 1951, he began a teaching career that spanned over 50 years. His first assignment was at Chaminade, where he taught religion, mathematics, Latin, English and economics for almost 10 years. For the next decade, he ministered in Africa.

In 1970, Brother Francis returned to Chaminade to teach mathematics for a year and then returned to Matero Boys School in Zambia where he taught, served as business manager and coached basketball and tennis until 1977.

After a sabbatical year in 1978 at Sangre de Cristo in Santa Fe, N.M., he spent his next 25 years teaching, tutoring, and supervising extracurricular activities at St. James H.S., Chester, Pa., Matero Boys School and Mother Seton Academy in Baltimore, Md.

In the late 1990s, he retired to The Franciscan at St. Leonard Care Center in Centerville, Ohio. In 2003, he moved to Mercy Siena healthcare center in Dayton where he spent his final years.

Brother Francis is survived by his brother, William, of East Meadow. Burial was in Holy Rood Cemetery, Westbury, L.I.

Mary Damato, the mother of Rita Damato, a member of the diocesan Stewardship and Development staff, died Feb. 26 at Coney Island Hospital, after a long illness. She was 89.

A Mass of Christian Burial was celebrated March 1 at St. Bernard’s Church, Mill Basin.

Burial was in Queen of All Saints Cemetery, Central Islip, L.I.

Other survivors include her granddaughters, Antonia Sciara, who works in the diocesan Human Resources Dept.; Deana Cestare, Roseann Damato and grandsons, Michael Damato and Christopher Damato.

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