You may remember the sad story of Deacon Adam Crowe, who died suddenly, just a few months before his scheduled ordination to the priesthood.

A reader alerted me to this touching tribute from a local paper in upstate New York:

Deacon Adam Crowe was counting the days until his ordination as priest.

“But God had other plans for him,” said the Most Rev. Robert Cunningham, bishop of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Ogdensburg.

The Heuvelton man, 26, died suddenly Jan. 27, less than four months before taking that final step to the priesthood.

He was the only seminarian from the diocese who would have been elevated to the priesthood this year.

“We were so looking forward to Adam’s ordination,” said the Rev. Roger McGuinness, pastor of St. Joseph’s Church in West Chazy.

For two summers, Deacon Crowe assisted McGuinness, then pastor of St. John’s Church in Plattsburgh.

“Then he came here several times for visits,” McGuinness said of the West Chazy parish. “He was here the weekend after Christmas — he preached on the Holy Family.”

Deacon Crowe also worked with St. Joseph’s discernment group for young adults, which reflects on vocations to the priesthood and deaconate.

The young man was devoted to encouraging vocations.

“I have loved every moment of my seminary education,” he said in a video shown at Masses throughout the diocese recently to promote the Bishop’s Fund. “It’s been a wonderful journey for me to walk along with the Lord and to feel him calling me to the priesthood, ultimately.”

Deacon Crowe had gone home to Heuvelton from St. Charles Borromeo Seminary in Philadelphia over Martin Luther King weekend and preached at St. Mary’s Church in Clayton. A few days later, he was leading prayers on a bus traveling to Washington, D.C., for the March for Life that demonstrates opposition to abortion.

He returned to the seminary, and, Jan. 26, was not feeling well.

“He said he had a headache — he thought he had a sinus infection,” said his mother, Theresa Crowe, from her Heuvelton home.

The next morning, still unwell, Deacon Crowe returned to the seminary rather than help serve Mass. Soon afterwards, he was found dead from causes yet to be determined.

“That’s the hardest part,” Mrs. Crowe said. “The not knowing.”

“It makes us all very sensitive to the fragility of life,” McGuinness said. “God doesn’t make a distinction between young and old, rich or poor, or even the calling.”

Deacon Crowe, who stood more than 6 feet tall, was a gentle giant who radiated good humor and love, say those who knew him.

When he spoke about his studies, about his coming ordination, said his mother, “he just glowed.”

“He was a wonderful young man,” said the bishop, who participated in a memorial Mass at the seminary last week that filled the chapel there. Participating were three cardinals, five bishops and more than 100 priests. Also there were about 150 seminarians, along with family, friends and clergy from St. Lawrence County.

“It was overpowering,” Mrs. Crowe said.

Deacon Crowe’s death, said Cardinal Justin Rigali, archbishop of Philadelphia, at the memorial Mass, issues a calling to others to open their hearts to the words of scripture.

“Dear Adam,” he directed his remarks to the young man himself, “the resurrection that awaited Jesus is your lot and ours. … In this promise we find strength and consolation.”

Even so, said McGuinness, a man of the cloth is not immune to grief.

“I can’t get my handle around the why of this,” he said. “Even though we’re priests and deacons working in the church, there are moments when you ask the same question everybody else asks — why.

“It challenges you.”

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