Father Ovidio Pecharromán, who was director of the diocesan Spanish Apostolate from 1993 to 2005, died Jan. 6 in Madrid at the age of 88.
Father Pecharromán, a member of the Brotherhood of Diocesan Worker Priests, was a beloved and influential presence who expanded Spanish-language training for seminarians as the diocese experienced significant growth in the Hispanic community.
“Father Ovidio labored with great zeal and enthusiasm for the good of all our people, especially for our Latino brothers and sisters,” said Bishop Emeritus Paul S. Loverde. “May he now be given in heaven the rich reward for his pastoral ministry in our diocese and beyond. May eternal life be his. I will remember him in prayer and during the Holy Masses I will offer for him.”
Father Tarsicio D. Buitrago, who assisted in the Spanish Apostolate, said Father Pecharromán founded the Hispanic ministry at Nativity Catholic Church in Burke and many of the Hispanic communities throughout the diocese. “He organized the pastoral training institute for lay leaders and also promoted the Charismatic Renewal with various prayer groups,” said Father Buitrago. “He was an extremely helpful and kind person, dedicated to the Hispanic apostolate, and concerned about all the activities of the Hispanic communities in the diocese.”
Born in Segovia, Spain, May 6, 1937, Father Pecharromán was ordained a priest June 5, 1965, at the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception in Washington after earning a bachelor’s degree in theology from The Catholic University of America in Washington in 1963. He also earned a doctorate in philosophy from Fordham University in New York in 1974.
All of Father Pecharromán’s pastoral activity was carried out in the U.S. He was named to a multicultural committee of the U.S. Commission on Evangelization representing the Washington-Baltimore metropolitan area in 2001.
In 2002, he became the national director of the Worker Priests, a secular institute of priests centered on vocations.
In 2005, he returned to Washington as an adviser to the Sol Vocational Institute for one academic year. In 2006, he was appointed episcopal vicar for the Diocese of San Bernardino, Calif., a position he held until 2008. He then returned to Washington as a professor at the Sol Center until 2010, and subsequently as its director until 2018.
Father Pecharromán moved to Spain in 2018, where he remained until his death.
