Serving on the Edges: 60 Years of Catholic Ministry, Faith, and Change — Father Francis Gargani

 

Airdate: January 21, 2026

Julie Rose: How do you stay connected to your faith in turbulent times?

Father Francis Gargani: I have, the joy of living with a wonderful religious community right now. I love praying with them. We pray regularly, and, I've been so blessed.

Julie Rose: Hey, it's Julie. Welcome to Uncomfy, a show about sticking with moments that challenge us even when they're uncomfortable. And I get it, nobody likes to be Uncomfy, but I have learned from experience, and maybe you have too, that sometimes a little bit of discomfort has benefits if we can stay open and curious about it. And that's what we're here to explore, so let's get Uncomfy. Today, I'm joined by Father Francis Gargani. He took his vows as a Roman Catholic male religious at the age of 19. He became a priest at 25, began his pastoral ministry the next year. Now, today, Father Gargani is 79 years old, and he's still serving as a priest in the Roman Catholic Church. He's a member of an order called the Redemptorists, and he lives and serves in Washington DC. Father Francis, welcome to Uncomfy. It's so great to have you.

Father Francis Gargani: Thank you. It's an honor to be here with you.

Julie Rose: I'm grateful that you're willing to talk about your own experience, and I was hoping you could start by telling us what led you to want to enter a religious order as a young man, age of 18 is when you initially entered in to become, I guess, the male equivalent of a nun, right? Why?

Father Francis Gargani: Exactly. Yeah, I mean, I ask myself that question, too. What did I know at that age, right?

Julie Rose: Yeah.

Father Francis Gargani: But the fact is that, um, you know, back then in the Middle Ages growing up in the fifties and sixties, and If you were a Roman Catholic and if you went to Roman Catholic schools, as I did, the idea of religious life was very present, always. Women religious who taught us, I was taught by Mercy Sisters, kind of used to, oftentimes, peg certain students to be the priests or nuns, you know?

Julie Rose: Oh really?

Father Francis Gargani: Yeah. The ones who were obviously, um, you know, who obeyed the rules and were helpful, and I was one of those people. I wasn't the only one, but I was one, but religion always played a very important part in my life as early as I can remember, I had, um, a very religious grandmother who had a very profound impact upon me. She actually had converted from Catholicism and had become a Pentecostal, you know, a "Holy Roller," they called them back then, and, um, but she had a profound influence in my life, but also there was something just within me that was naturally attracted to religion and its practices, and, um, I went off to college, to a state college and was when I was in that state college, they had a large vocation fair where lots of religious orders were present, passing out literature and I got to meet Redemptorists who were just ordained, and they were enthusiastic and personality, and brought me to the major seminary for an interview, and while I was there, the bell rang, and I peeked in, and I saw the chapel, which was absolutely breathtaking at that moment, and the guys all walking in, and I could hear their rosary beads swishing and smell the incense. I said, "This is it." I was young and impressionable and that kind of stuff, you know, caught my fancy, but at the same time, I, when I entered, which was 1964, the civil rights was going on, and you would see priests marching along in protests, and that powerfully influenced me.

Julie Rose: So, Father Francis, um, as I mentioned, you're 79. You have been in the priesthood or in a religious order your entire adult life.

Father Francis Gargani: Oh yeah.

Julie Rose: Why have you stayed? How, has there been a moment of, of sort of challenge for you that you'd be willing to share with us?

Father Francis Gargani: Yeah, I, um, I had two pastoral experiences in parishes. One was in north, up in New York state in Saratoga Springs. I was there for six years. I was, uh, finally got a team of other Redemptorists to join me, but we had terrible, um, what's the right word, conflict with the pastor at the time who wasn't present at all. He would leave the parish and only show up on the weekends, and he did that for two years, and it became impossible for us to actually minister with all the programs we were implementing, and when we had a visitation from our religious order, uh, leaders, we told them he had to go. "They had to change him or change us," and instead of changing him, they changed us, and that was very painful for me. Extremely painful. I was very young, and I was 32, then I went to a parish in Pittsburgh and decided I would give it my all, and when they had a visitation this time, they removed both the pastor and I for doing wild, crazy things, like putting women in ministry, and it was all already, you know, work that had been implemented by the Vatican Council, but there was a group of people who, not large, but very conservative, very angry with the changes of the church and who came to a meeting with that visitation team and was screaming about us, and they just removed us without any consultation. So, both those occasions were very difficult.

Julie Rose: Yeah, no, I can imagine. I mean, conflict is always terrible and to feel rejected or feel dismissed, um, but sort of on a, you know, this is more than just your job, right? Like, you'd also kind of devoted your life, so how did you kind of, how did you work through that to decide, uh, that you could actually keep leaning into it and, and still believe that you can make a difference?

Father Francis Gargani: Yeah, I, you know, when you look back and you say, "How did you work through that?" But, um, one of the things that kept me holding on by my toenails was the relationships I had already made with various Redemptorists. It just felt like I couldn't leave them. They were part of me. They were my family, and I still believed very much in our religious community and what it was about and its history, and I loved, loved, loved our founder and several of our saints, and it really at that point, you know. The Redemptorists was, uh, part of my, ba, marrow, of my bones, and so I'm not going to lie, I went through some really difficult time. I got permission after I was removed from Pittsburgh. They had originally signed me to another parish, and I knew I couldn't do that. I got permission then to come here to Washington, this is 40 years ago, lived in the same house and I did a master's program in worship or liturgy they call it, at Catholic University, which is just two blocks up here, from here, and, um, what dug in for me was I made the decision then that I wouldn't just allow the Redemptorists leaders, as it were, the administration, to just send me anywhere, that I should have some say in that, and, um, I was attracted to do campus ministry, so when I finished the degree work at Catholic U, I did take a position as a campus minister at Old Dominion University, and campus ministry was a gift to me at that time in my life, and it was a challenge, but, um, I had a lot of wonderful help from people and the parishes there and, um, just did well and, uh, was able to go from about 25, 30 kids coming to mass on a Sunday night to about 300.

Julie Rose: What were they attracted to, do you think?

Father Francis Gargani: Yeah, just, you know, uh, I'd like to say some of my preaching maybe, and also, you know, we developed a real program that included social outreach. We had, Tuesday night, we had Pasta with the Pastor, and I usually would always have, uh, one of the other campus ministers from the other traditions, including the rabbi. We had dinner all the time after mass on Sunday nights and had all the communities, the parishes of that area, coming and presenting these meals, and so I got tremendous amount of support.

Julie Rose: Father Francis, you've already alluded to it, but I know from a conversation that we've had that, uh, much of the work that you've done over your life in religious service has involved kind of pushing at the fringes of society, working in ways that maybe weren't totally accepted by the mainstream or by a more conservative part of your, um, of the church, right, um, which is always deeply Uncomfy, to feel like your calling is to kind of, kind of be out there a little bit on the edge, so would you tell us about, uh, actually, I'd love to hear about the work that you did with AIDS patients early on in your ministry.

Father Francis Gargani: Well, the AIDS, um, ministry as such didn't break out till I went to campus ministry and I went to campus ministry in Norfolk in '84, and they had just created what was called the Tidewater AIDS Crisis Task Force, and it was, um, training people to be what they call "buddies," to support people with AIDS, to help them get shopping for them, their groceries, to do household chores for them, and so I immediately, um, volunteered. I did the training, I was the first graduate, and, um, I would go to people with AIDS' homes, and I would pray with them, I would hold them, I would see them to their death, and then for some, I would either have a memorial service, and for those who were Catholic, I had a funeral mass, and I loved doing it, and it meant a lot to me, and then I, uh, we formed, um, with the student union of the university, um, sort of a task force to raise awareness among the students, and, um, what really, I guess, was like, "I couldn't not do this work," was one of the young men who worked in the student union office, it was a college student, but he was doing that, of course, part-time work, um, to pay his way through college, he got AIDS, and, um, he, um, the impact of that on the campus then made that work all the more valuable, and from that also developed a regular LGBTQ group that, um, I also helped facilitate with one of the, uh, directors of the student union office.

Julie Rose: Uh, later, I know you ended up on the front page of the New York Times, actually, for some of the outreach work that you were doing. This is, at the time, you were in New Jersey, I guess, right, working with an, with LGBTQ,

Father Francis Gargani: mm-hmm,

Julie Rose: Catholics.

Father Francis Gargani: Yeah, I was actually based in Brooklyn and maybe first I was in the Bronx for 10 years and then I went to Brooklyn for 10 years. It was during that time that I, um, was able to connect with this wonderful group run by a terrific guy named David Harvey, and the group is called In God's Image. and I would, when I could, attend their meetings and just be a support for the group, and I gave I think one or two different retreat days, days of prayer and reflection. And then it was his, it was David's idea to, um, maybe just run an opportunity for some of the folks who wanted to do a tour of the cathedral in Newark because the cathedral is exceptionally beautiful, and the new Archbishop there, Cardinal Archbishop, had, just happened to be a Redemptorists whom I knew very well, so, um, he suggested to ask the Cardinal if we came over for a visit on some Sunday afternoon if he'd be able to just greet the folks, which of course he was very open and willing to do, and so that's how that, um, whole thing happened. We ended up having a mass, we ended up having many more people than we thought, and, um,

Julie Rose: you got some, you, you, you got some, um, backlash from that. I mean, I guess just the optics, right, of,

Father Francis Gargani: oh my gosh,

Julie Rose: Catholic priest who's leading a mass for, specifically for this LGBTQ community in the cathedral.

Father Francis Gargani: I think the poor Cardinal got a lot more than I did, and he still does. He's a wonderful guy, and he's still fortunately serving there, but I continue to be connected to this IGI group, not as much as when I lived in Brooklyn, but, um, you know, have still maintained, um, doing a retreat day and Lent for them, and, you know, can, I tune in when sometimes to some of their meetings and stuff. 

Julie Rose: So, I guess kind of circling back to where we started, Father Francis, why do you choose to stay and keep leaning into this work today, each day that you wake up? Is that a choice you feel like you need to make? 

Father Francis Gargani: Yeah, I mean, you know, one of the gifts of my life now is that I'm part of five intentional communities. Uh, these are groups of Catholics who just didn't fit into the mold of an ordinary Catholic parish, many of them because, uh, they started after the Vatican Council, and they were in parishes that were refusing to really renovate the liturgy, to allow women to be eucharistic ministers or women to be scripture readers, and so, even back then, they were encouraged by the bishop to form their own community, and the bishops at the time would even assign priests to them, and they didn't own a place, and they used their money more for social justice work. So, those communities still survive to this day, some of them. There's about 50 of them, at least, in the United States, and they get priests like, renegades like me.

Julie Rose: Oh wow. A "renegade," that's funny. You see yourself as a renegade, then?

Father Francis Gargani: Well, I don't try to be, but even, even when I'm not even trying, I get people running up after mass yelling at me that, you know, instead of saying "Pope," I said, "Holy Father," whatever the thing might be they, they're like, they're like they're trying to catch it because all our parishes are divided like the nation is, and you have some people representing the far right as you have people on the left, and some, and other people will come up and say, "Oh, I'm so grateful you brought up the issue of racism," or, "I'm so grateful you brought up the issue of immigration," which is one of my big things right now for the immigrants, you know? But, um, there are other people immediately who will attack you for being partisan if you say a kind word or a supportive word for the immigrant.

Julie Rose: Yeah, and so how do you, I mean, how are you dealing, how do you respond to that criticism?

Father Francis Gargani: That's why I was at that conference where you and I met. I've gotta learn how to use dignity. 

Julie Rose: Right, find a way to respond that honors the dignity in, in the person that is criticizing you. 

Father Francis Gargani: Correct. 

Julie Rose: It's not easy for any of us, Father Francis. I guess I'm, I guess even if, if a man in your, in your position struggles with that, that, that just goes to show, yeah.

Father Francis Gargani: It's not easy, and, um, at my age, I'm gonna be 80 in March, um, you know, you, I thank God that I still have had reasonably good health. I can work full-time still, and I love working full-time, and so, but in, in all honesty, you, you kind of create where you can best function, and right now I'm best functioning on the edge with fringe groups, with outliers like myself, with the leftover hippie that I am like myself, you know? That, I mean, that's the truth, so that's why I'm in this Uncomfy place.

Julie Rose: Yes, well, I have really enjoyed hearing your stories, Father Francis. If I could ask you one more question, um, where are you finding the most peace in your life these days?

Father Francis Gargani: Well, to be honest with you, I have, the joy of living with a wonderful religious community right now, and I have had it since I've been here in Washington, and they're just wonderful men who, um, are very supportive, and I love praying with them. We pray regularly three times a day and, um, sharing our special days, and we do recreational things together as well as spiritual things, but, um, you know, there's a, a certain familiarity you get at this stage of the game with God, and I am utterly convicted and convinced of this love of God. I've been so blessed. I feel so honored to, um, to do whatever I can do and to help, uh, build up God's kingdom on this earth and to be a voice for the voiceless, and, um, I'm very much, um, as discouraged as I can get, like everyone else, with incredible polarization in our country and the, the fear I have of the disintegration of our democracy. I just, uh, manage to, uh, stay hopeful because of this mystery that, you know, your faith and my faith is grounded on that God is one with us, and I'm convinced of that, and I, I'm overwhelmed with grace most every day. 

Julie Rose: Father Francis Gargani is a Catholic priest in Washington DC. He's a member of the Redemptorists of Baltimore Province. Father Francis, thank you so much for your time.

Father Francis Gargani: Yeah, it was an honor to be with you, Julie.

Julie Rose: And thank you for getting Uncomfy with us today. I have experienced Uncomfy moments in my own faith journey, and I'd love to hear how you have worked through that discomfort in your own life. How have you stayed connected? What has given you a sense of peace? I could really relate to Father Francis's connection to his community and sense of purpose, and the way he described his relationship with God really struck a chord with me. So, I'd love to hear your story. Email uncomfy@byu.edu or find us on social media to continue the conversation; we are @uncomfy.podcast. Uncomfyis a BYUradio podcast. Samuel Benson produces it, and the team includes Hyobin Kim and Sam Payne. Our theme music was composed by Kelsey Nay. I'm Julie Rose. Can't wait to get Uncomfy with you again next week.