New Marian grotto honors late priest, hall named for bishop

By Tanya Connor
The Catholic Free Press

People from different parishes contributed to a Marian grotto honoring a beloved priest.
The grotto, unveiled at St. Joan of Arc Parish in Worcester Sunday, is dedicated to Father Walter J. Riley, who was pastor of St. Anne Parish in Shrewsbury when he died suddenly on Feb. 9, 2024. He had offered to help with St. Joan of Arc’s grotto, explained the parish’s administrator, Father Enoch K. Kyeremateng.

His parishioners and Father Riley’s former parishioners – from St. Anne’s, Immaculate Conception in Worcester and St. Luke the Evangelist in Westborough – helped fund the approximately $7,000 grotto, which is all paid for, Father Kyeremateng said. Some attended the blessing Sunday.

That day Bishop McManus also blessed the gathering space beneath St. Joan of Arc Church, newly named Bishop McManus Hall.  

The dedications were part of the parish’s 75th anniversary celebrations, which included a Mass and banquet Sunday.

At Mass, Trang Charlton and her family, members of Immaculate Conception and close friends of Father Riley, were honored with a plaque. They donated the 550-pound statue of Our Lady of Lourdes for the grotto and she coordinated the project, Father Kyeremateng said.  

“It’s a true labor of love,” Mrs. Charlton said. “I love Father Enoch too.”  

Father Kyeremateng, who is also chaplain of the diocese’s African Ministry, said he lived with Father Riley at his parishes because “he wanted me to be with him; there was a spiritual bond that brought us together.”  

When Father Kyeremateng was appointed temporary administrator of St. Joan of Arc in March 2023, Father Riley asked, “What can I do to support you?” Father Kyeremateng wanted a Marian grotto, since he’d seen people praying before a small statue of Mary in front of the rectory.

He said Father Riley, who had a Marian shrine on St. Anne’s lawn, suggested the spot for St. Joan of Arc’s grotto. Father Kyeremateng said that was a good place because “you just enter the [parish] compound and you see it.” Father Riley said, “We will get it done,” but died before the project started.

“I get most of the things I do, in prayer,” Father Kyeremateng said. Reflecting on what to do for the parish’s 75th anniversary, he thought about dedicating the grotto to Father Riley, given his “impeccable devotion to our Mother Mary.”

“He would have loved it – any type of dedication to the Blessed Mother,” Father Riley’s sister Mary Dowd said after the grotto blessing. “I have a new place to come say my rosary.”

“My mother would be thrilled; the Blessed Mother was her ‘go-to’” – after Jesus – said their sister Margaret “Peg” Riley Holloway. She said the dedication of the grotto, beneath which are stones honoring their parents and other people, is “such a great honor” for her brother, their family and the community, in which he had a great impact. They were brought up at St. Bernard Parish in Worcester but her family followed Father Riley and now belongs to St. Anne’s, she said.

“We pray there will be miracles” happening at the grotto, Father Kyeremateng said. “We invite everyone to come” and pray there.

Parish council members were excited when he suggested dedicating the grotto to Father Riley and the hall to Bishop McManus, he said.

The hall’s name “is to let him know that his legacy and his episcopal ministry will never be forgotten,” Father Kyeremateng said, expressing appreciation for the bishop’s prayers, celebrating Mass at St. Joan of Arc, sending good priests and showing love for the ethnic groups there.

He said future generations can be told who Bishop McManus was, as he was told about the room named for Bishop John J. Wright, the diocese’s first bishop, who established the parish his first year here.

Bishop McManus said this is the first time something has been named after him, and called it a “very kind gesture.”