Public funeral for Fr. Jim Callan will take place Saturday

ROCHESTER, N.Y. — The public will gather on Saturday to remember the life of Fr. Jim Callan, the progressive religious leader who was instrumental in founding the Spiritus Christi Catholic Church.

The funeral mass is scheduled for 10 a.m. at the Rochester Riverside Convention Center. His obituary says all people are welcome to attend and you can share a memory of Fr. Jim through the Harris Funeral Home website. The burial will be private.

“Fr. Callan will be remembered as a very happy priest who loved the people he served,” the obituary says.

Fr. Jim advocated for ordaining women as priests, marrying gay couples, and inviting non-Catholics to participate in communion. These actions led to his dismissal from Corpus Christi Church in 1998. Shortly after, he encouraged Mary Ramerman to establish and lead Spiritus Christi, a church that grew from the Corpus Christi community.

In the 1980s, Fr. Jim worked with the Isaiah House Hospice Program, the first hospice program to accept AIDS patients. He ministered to and ran housing, food, and medicine programs for people with AIDS.