From the desk of the Tar Heel disciple:
September 5, 2025
Father Thomas F. Price, born in Wilmington, North Carolina, in 1860, was the first man ordained for service as a Catholic priest in the state of North Carolina, in 1886. After 25 years as a missionary priest, serving mostly in the eastern part of the state, with the encouragement of the American bishops and the approval of the Holy See, he worked with a Boston priest, Father James A. Walsh, to establish the first foreign mission society in the United States, which is popularly known as Maryknoll. Father Price led the first group of American missionary priests to China, where he died on September 12, 1919.
When Father Price left for China in 1917, he was accompanied by three much younger men, all recently ordained. He had been struggling with poor health for some time. But he had volunteered for the work in southeastern China, as he was the only member of the new missionary society with significant pastoral experience, experience that he had gained in North Carolina. In the devastatingly hot and humid summer of 1919, Father Price’s health declined dramatically, though he did all that was humanly possible to continue to serve the people of the mission and to direct his younger associates as their superior. Finally, when his pains became unbearable, he traveled to Hong Kong, where he was admitted to Saint Paul's Hospital. He was diagnosed with a ruptured appendix and scheduled for surgery.
The nursing Sister who prepared Father Price for surgery recorded his last actions and words. On the morning of September 8, the Feast of the Nativity of Mary, Father Price offered Mass in the hospital chapel. It was to be his last Mass. As he was being taken to the operating room, he told the Sister, “Today is a nice day to go to heaven.” However, despite the inability of the doctors to heal him, he survived the surgery. The following days were difficult for him, but he persevered in prayer throughout the last agony and after receiving the Sacraments, he died on September 12, the Feast of the Holy Name of Mary.
The cause for the beatification and canonization of the Servant of God Thomas Frederick Price was opened in the Diocese of Raleigh in 2012 and concluded in 2018, when the documents of the diocesan phase were duly submitted to the Holy See for their consideration.
For more on the life of Fr. Price:
https://maryknollsociety.org/vocations/father-thomas-frederick-price/
