On Thursday, Sept. 25, the Father Bill Atkinson O.S.A. Service Corps will host the 4th Father Bill Atkinson Pilgrimage on campus.
This event aims to celebrate and honor the life and legacy of Father Bill, former Augustinian Friar and current candidate for sainthood in the Catholic Church.
According to its website, “The Father Bill Atkinson Service Corps launched in 2021 to enable individuals with intellectual disabilities to reach their full potential and participate meaningfully in the community. Members include individuals with intellectual disabilities, professional staff and volunteers, such as Villanova University students, retired educators and business leaders.”
“The Corps are a community of differently abled who take inspiration from Fr. Bill’s life and the joy with which he lived his life, his patience and the community and support that he had,” Rev. Rob Hagan, O.S.A. said in his email.
The pilgrimage is a way that our community keeps Father Bill’s spirit and message alive. Hundreds of people are expected to attend the service that begins at St. Thomas of Villanova Church at 3:30 p.m.
The service will include prayer intentions, gospel reading and hymns, a visit and offer of prayer at Father Bill’s crypt, and a four mile walk to Our Lady of Assumption in Wayne. This walk is what Father Hagan refers to as a “symbol of strength.”
“It’s a day of remembrance of not just what has happened but what is happening,” Father Hagan said. “Knowing that God’s spirit is still alive with us today and to look for it and ways to cultivate it in the lives of one another.”
Father Bill, the first ordained quadriplegic priest, led a devoted and resilient life in faith, defying expectations of continuing his pursuit to priesthood after a tobogganing accident left him unable to walk for the rest of his life at the age of 19.
“He was an incredible model of the values of faith, perseverance, patience, trust and surrender to the Lord,” Father Hagan said. “He did all those things to such a high degree that after he passed in 2006, there really was a movement of people whose lives were impacted by his heroic virtue, the standard that they use for canonization.”
The stories of Father Bill’s selfless guidance through parishioners’ struggles and intercessions received after his passing are what are collected and contributed to his cause for canonization.
While saints are usually seen as distant figures of the past, this is not the case with Father Bill.
“Father Bill’s story is one that can resonate with everyone in our community because he studied at Villanova, rooted for the Wildcats, and worked in the archdiocese of Philadelphia,” Father Hagan said. “This is one of our own, someone who lived and ate at the same halls that our students do-this is their brother. There is a certain closeness and proximity to his life that people can relate to and that’s why we moved him to the campus-to inspire people to live the way he did.”
With his crypt now on campus at St. Thomas of Villanova Church, his message is all the more accessible to our community.
“I would invite anybody to attend who may be wrestling with something in their life,” Fr. Hagan said, “something that they are trying to overcome, something that they’re trying to get through and searching for patience-to invite him into their lives.”
