Funeral arrangements have been set for the Rev. John J. Large, who died on Sunday at Villa St. Joseph in Darby, surrounded by family, friends and fellow clergy. He was 76.
A viewing will take place on Friday, Aug. 28, at 4 p.m., at St. Gabriel Church, in Norwood, Delaware County, followed by a parish Mass at 7 p.m.
A second viewing will be held on Saturday, Aug. 29, at 9:30 a.m., followed by his Funeral Mass at 11 a.m.
Archbishop Nelson J. Pérez will celebrate the Funeral Mass. Concelebrants will be Monsignors Hugh Shields and Hank McKee and the Revs. John Lyons and John Hand. The Rev. Victor Eschbach will be the homilist.
Following the Funeral Mass, there will be a luncheon in the auditorium and then burial at Saints Peter and Paul Cemetery in Springfield.
Large is survived by his younger brother and sister-in-law, Joseph and Elsa Large, and nephews Jonathan, Matthew and Daniel.
Large was born on Oct. 3, 1949, the son of the late William F. Large and the late Martha Danielwicz. He attended St. Vincent DePaul, St. Martin and Holy Child parochial schools, and Cardinal Dougherty High School, before entering St. Charles Borromeo Seminary.
Large was ordained on May 17, 1975, at the Cathedral Basilica of Saints Peter and Paul by John Cardinal Krol.
Large served as parochial vicar at St. Robert in Chester, St. Ambrose Parish in Olney and St. Gabriel in Norwood. He served on the faculty at Roman Catholic High School and as chaplain at West Catholic. He was serving as pastor at Mater Dolorosa in Frankford and St. Joan of Arc in Harrowgate when those churches closed in 2013, then served as pastor at St. Paul in South Philadelphia from 2013 to 2020. He then served as parochial vicar, with senior priest status, at St. Anselm in Parkwood from 2020 until June 2024, when he retired from ministry.
The obituary on the Cavanagh Family Funeral Homes website noted that Large “wrote his sermons in longhand and delivered them with his trademark passion, often infusing humor or rhymes to make complex spiritual truths more relatable and to use a well-timed laugh to open a closed mind.”
“I feel that he took chains from us to make our lives more bearable, and he carried them around for us,” said Linda McNulty, business manager at St. Anselm, in the online obituary. “I’ve known him since 2020, but I feel like I’ve known him my entire life. He taught me the importance of gratitude.”
McNulty recalled how Large loved handing out homemade prayer cards, a collector’s item for many parishioners. One of his favorites read, “Keep on, Keepin On,” code to push forward even when life gets hard. ••
