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Fr. Mel Uzdrowski, O.S.B.
Our confrere, Father Mel (Raymond) Uzdrowski, died suddenly at the Abbey on the afternoon of April 21, 2009.
Arrangements
The Reception of Fr. Mel and Vigil Service:
Friday, April 24th at 7:00 PM in the Abbey Church
The Funeral and Burial:
Saturday, April 25th at 10:00 AM in the Abbey Church (burial in the Abbey Cemetery following Mass)
Biography
Raymond Uzdrowski was born on July 2, 1927, in Chicago's Misericordia Hospital. His adoptive parents both died before the boy's tenth birthday.
Raymond then came under the wing of a Chicago judge, George Rooney, who enrolled him for six years in St. Joseph's Academy for Boys in LaGrange, Illinois. Judge Rooney then arranged with Father John Cherf, Rector of St. Procopius Academy, for the youngster to come to Lisle, where he attended the Academy and subsequently St. Procopius College.
As well as participating in athletics, Raymond served as student infirmarian for six years. Entering the monastery after graduating from the College with a degree in philosophy, he professed vows on June 29, 1952.
After serving as a prefect during his theological studies, Father Mel was ordained to the priesthood by Bishop Martin McNamara at St. Raymond Nonnatus Cathedral in Joliet on May 3, 1956. That same year, St. Procopius Academy moved across Maple Avenue to take up its new location in what had formerly been St. Joseph's Orphanage, and Father Mel was placed in charge of the newly-established Academy Library. A number of summers were spent at The Catholic University of America, living in Caldwell Hall ("Mildew U.," as he not so affectionately remembered it) and studying library science, in which field in completed his master's degree in 1965.
He held the position of head librarian at St. Procopius, then Benet, Academy for nearly thirty years, until 1985. This meant that in 1976 he had to supervise another move, into the new library facilities built as part of St. Thomas Hall. Father Mel was also one of the Academy's prefects until the boarding school closed in 1967, and even after that point he continued to reside on the Academy's campus. When Abbot Hugh Anderson was elected in 1985, Father Mel replaced him as associate pastor of St. Joan of Arc Parish in Lisle, and there he served for six years. Returning then to the Abbey, in which he had not resided practically since novitiate, he adjusted with far less difficulty than he expected to the day-to-day life of the community, within which he was a steady and usually cheerful presence.
He assisted the Abbey's Business Manager in a variety of ways over the next decade. Father Mel's love for the outdoors found expression both in the fishing trips he much enjoyed and in taking charge of the Abbey's small truck garden.
A variety of physical problems, including partial deafness, diabetes, heart attacks, kidney failure, and a crippling ankle injury, afflicted him in his final years, but he continued as long as he could with his various duties, slowly making his way around the house to lock up every night, helping with hearing confessions and other ministerial work that did not require much standing.
Even in his final years in a wheelchair, he sought to attend all community exercises, up to the day of his death.
Please remember Father Mel in your prayers.
Abbot Dismas and Community
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