Josephite Father Richard Wagner dies at 91

An 11 a.m. funeral Mass for Josephite Father Richard F. Wagner will be offered May 3 at Church of the Incarnation in Washington, D.C. Father Wagner died April 26. He was 91.

A native of Rochester, N.Y., Father Wagner was ordained a Josephite priest in 1959. He served as pastor of St. Veronica in Cherry Hill from 1968 to 1973, where he was involved in getting a Head Start program launched. Elsewhere, he ministered in Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama and Florida.

In a 2023 interview with The Josephite Harvest, Father Wagner said he became a Josephite because the Baltimore-based religious society’s apostolate was the Black community.

“I wanted to serve the Black community because of what I had seen, what I grew up with in the age of segregation,” he said. “Things were not as they should be. The church was not committing itself as they should be. Now there is more of a need for the Josephites in the Black community than ever before.”

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