Father Joseph Donald Cahill, SM, died on June 18. He was 95 years old and a professed Marianist for 74 years.
A gentle-mannered and well-traveled priest, Father Don was a pastor, chaplain, counselor, and teacher at numerous schools, parishes and communities. He wanted to use his priesthood to bring others closer to Christ and His mother.
Joseph Donald Cahill was born in Detroit on Aug. 5, 1928. He was the first of seven children of Thomas and Mary (Sheedy) Cahill. He attended Holy Redeemer Grade School and High School in Detroit, where he first encountered the Marianists. There, Don befriended Father Glennon McCarty, Brother Theodore Hoeffken and Brother James Pieper, who encouraged him to follow his calling to religious life and remained lifelong friends.
In 1948, he chose to join the Society of Mary, writing that he would eventually seek the priesthood because it provided “more opportunities to help guide and save souls.” He entered the novitiate at Marynook in Galesville, Wisconsin, later that fall and professed his first vows on Sept. 24, 1949. He then attended scholasticate at Saint Mary’s University, earning a bachelor’s degree in history in 1952 and professed perpetual vows in Galesville on July 16, 1955.
Subsequently, Father Don taught religion and social studies at St. Mary’s High School in St. Louis. He taught for another year at Central Catholic in San Antonio.
In 1957, Brother Don wrote to his provincial superior asking to begin seminary studies. He was ordained in Fribourg on June 11, 1961, then returned to Holy Redeemer in Detroit to celebrate his first Mass with his family present.
After his ordination, he was assigned to St. John Vianney High School in Kirkwood as a chaplain and teacher in 1962. He would go on to complete three more stints at Vianney (1969-71, 1973-74, 1994-2002). Father Don also taught and served as chaplain at McBride in St. Louis (1965-66), Nolan in Fort Worth (1966-69), Thomas More in Milwaukee (1974-75) and Bishop McGuinness in Oklahoma City (1978-79).
Father Don took summer classes and earned a master’s degree in guidance and counseling from Texas Christian University in 1970. He later studied in preparation to become a hospital chaplain and especially valued a course on clinical pastoral education, which he credited with teaching him to better serve the needs of others and to approach people with an openness to such needs.
Father Don performed chaplain duties at hospitals in Milwaukee and La Crosse in Wisconsin from 1975-81. He served as assistant pastor at Holy Rosary Parish in San Antonio, Texas (1965-66) and St. Mary’s Parish in Fort Worth (1982-83), but he conducted the bulk of his parish work at Our Lady of the Pillar in St. Louis (1981-82, 1984-91, 1994-2004). For many years, he spent weekdays teaching scripture to freshmen at Vianney in an arrangement he considered “the best of both worlds.”
Into his 80s, Father Don was a chaplain at the Cure of Ars Marianist Community on the Vianney campus. Although his teaching career had officially ended, he still filled in as a substitute and spent hours working in the school library. In his 60th year as a priest, in 2021, Father Don reflected on the Eucharist and the sacrament of reconciliation: “Those sacraments were graces for me, and I hope and pray they were graces for all those who shared them with me.”
