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Msgr. Mahler celebrates 60 years serving the Lord

Katie Scott | Catholic Herald

His apartment filled with maps, nature photographs and numerous photos, Msgr. Mahler points out a picture of his ordination class. Ordained May 3, 1956, in New York City by Cardinal Francis Spellman for the Richmond Diocese, he was incardinated into the Arlington Diocese in 1975.

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Msgr. Frank E. Mahler relaxes with the newspaper on the patio at St. Rose of Lima Priests’ Retirement Villa in Annandale. Named a monsignor in 1982, he’s spent more than a half-century serving parishes across the region.

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Msgr. Mahler prays in the retirement villa chapel. He retired in 2004 to Blessed Sacrament Church in Alexandria and moved to the villa about six years later.

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Sixty years ago, Msgr. Frank E. Mahler celebrated his first
Mass amid chairs, lamps and a couch. The modest, homey
setting was a fitting start to a priesthood marked by service
to the family, the elderly and the sick.

Ordained May 3, 1956, in New York City by Cardinal Francis
Spellman for the Richmond Diocese, he received permission to
have the Mass in the living room of his ill mother, who was
unable to attend the ordination. With a few friends and
family gathered and his mother resting on the couch, the new
priest celebrated the sacrament just as he would for years to
come in churches across the Arlington Diocese.

As founding pastor of St. Lawrence the Martyr Church in
Alexandria and the first pastor of St. Clare of Assisi Church
in Clifton – Msgr. Mahler helped form the diocese. But it
also helped form him.

“The faith people at the parishes evidenced and the strength
and encouragement I’ve received from them have helped my own
faith tremendously,” said Msgr. Mahler, 86, during an
interview in his apartment at St. Rose of Lima Priests’
Retirement Villa in Annandale. He retired in 2004 and moved
to the villa in 2010.


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Born Dec. 15, 1929, in Bay Shore, N.Y., he grew up with his
older sister in Long Island. After graduating from St.
Jerome’s College in Ontario, Canada, he entered St. Mary’s
Seminary in Baltimore.

As a young boy, he was drawn to the priesthood and hoped he
could unite it with his deep love of nature. When Maryknoll
missionaries spoke at his religious education class, he said
he remembers thinking “how great it would be to combine
agriculture work with missionary work.” But when his father
died while he was in high school, his mother asked him to
stay closer to home.

Following his ordination, the young priest was named
parochial vicar of St. Thomas More in Arlington, then part of
the Richmond Diocese. He would go on to serve as parochial
vicar of a number of parishes, and along with founding St.
Lawrence and serving as the first pastor of St. Clare, he was
pastor of Good Shepherd in Alexandria, St. John the Beloved
in McLean and St. John the Apostle in Leesburg.

Msgr. Mahler served in Wyoming for two years before taking a
one-year leave from active ministry. During his leave, he
managed business operations at the Clarendon Metro in
Arlington.

When his co-workers discovered he was a priest, “they cleaned
up their jokes,” he laughed. Over time, they began inviting
him for coffee, sharing family problems and asking for
spiritual guidance. “Some even wanted to come back into the
church,” said Msgr. Mahler.

In 1975, he returned to active ministry in the newly formed
Arlington Diocese. “Bishop (Thomas J.) Welsh asked me if I
would consider coming back, and I’m forever grateful he did,”
said Msgr. Mahler, looking up at a painting of Bishop Welsh
hanging on his apartment wall.

At each parish he’s served in, Msgr. Mahler has made care of
the sick and elderly a priority. “After visiting the sick, 99
percent of the time I came away strengthened and with more
than I gave them,” he said. He added that at this stage in
life he has “an even greater appreciation of what people went
through, from trouble walking to giving up driving.”

Msgr. Mahler also cherishes the time he spent working with
youths and couples, “helping them work the inevitable
difficulties out,” he said, before turning attention away
from himself.

“Whether you’re single or married, if lives are lived serving
the Lord, there is no one vocation better than the other,”
said Msgr. Mahler. “If people in the faith try to serve the
way they’ve been called, that’s the only way to have any
degree of happiness and accomplishment in life.”

After six decades serving the church he loves, Msgr. Mahler
seems to have achieved more than a degree of both.

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