Reverend Jules G. Yallaly, CM
1909 – 2007

By Father Lawrence Asma, CM

Reverend Jules G. Yallaly, CM

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Father Jules Yallaly, CM, was a friendly, outgoing sort of man who will be remembered by many seminarians, patients, nurses, and doctors as much for his prodigious memory as for his personable attentiveness. He could remember people’s names and something about them even if he had met them casually only once, and that a year before. He was loved and admired by many.

When he first started working as a chaplain at DePaul Hospital in 1969, then still on Kingshighway in St. Louis, he was answerable only to the president of the hospital and was paid out of petty cash. For at least one year, being the only priest on staff, he both lived and worked in the hospital, and was able to leave the grounds for only a few hours on Friday afternoons when someone lent him a car. He would work at that institution until 2000.

One of the ways Fr. Yallaly worked to maintain the Catholic identity of DePaul after it had moved to the suburb of Bridgeton, Missouri, and changed its name from ‘hospital’ to ‘health center’, especially in his later years, was to offer blessings to anybody who came near him. One time he asked an anxious new social worker who passed him in the corridor if she wanted a blessing. Embarrassed, she stammered that she was Jewish. He said, “Oh, I have a Jewish blessing right here,” as he reached in his pocket. Smiling, she often later mentioned that blessing to others, saying, “I finally felt like I belonged.”

His ordained ministry was of paramount importance to him. Even when he went on vacation, it was often as a chaplain on a Catholic bus tour. Fr. Yallaly celebrated his 60th anniversary of ordination practically the whole year long. It included a trip to Rome and a visit with Pope John Paul II, with whom he said Mass (Fr. Yallaly was the only concelebrant) in the pope’s private chapel, an event about which he seldom spoke, but which deeply pleased him.

He bore without complaint the physical ordeals that came with increasing age and eventually died peacefully at Perry County Memorial Hospital in Perryville, Missouri on July 17, 2007. His life of faithful service had begun 97 years before when he was born into the prayerful household of William and Mary Yallaly in St. Mary, Missouri, one of six siblings. As he matured he studied at St. Vincent High School and St. Mary’s Seminary in Perryville, entered the Congregation of the Mission in 1927, made final vows in 1929, and was ordained by Bishop C. H. Winklemann at St. Mary’s of the Barrens in 1936.

He received a Master’s degree in Latin from DePaul University in 1942, and a Doctorate in Latin and Greek from St. Louis University in 1952.

His teaching assignments were to St. John’s Seminary in Kansas City (1936 – 1943), Los Angeles Preparatory Seminary (1943 – 1948), St. Louis Preparatory Seminary (1948 – 1949, 1952 – 1957), and finally to St. Thomas Seminary in Denver where he also served in administration (1957 – 1969).

Fr. Yallaly is survived by a brother, Thomas Yallaly of St. Louis, and a sister, Ruth Hahn of Modoc, Illinois. He was laid to rest in the Vincentian Community Cemetery at St. Mary’s of the Barrens.