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The Reverend Rosalie “Rody” <I>Heffelfinger</I> Hall

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The Reverend Rosalie “Rody” Heffelfinger Hall

Birth
Duluth, St. Louis County, Minnesota, USA
Death
24 Jun 2007 (aged 79)
France
Burial
Cremated, Ashes scattered. Specifically: St. Croix River Add to Map
Memorial ID
View Source
By the time Rody Hall and her now late husband, Ted, sailed down the Mississippi River in a lobster boat in 1984, she had already lived what would seem to many to have been "several lifetimes." She was known and respected as a philanthropist and successful fundraiser. After the river trip, which she recounted in a book, "A River Echoes in My Ministry" (Kirkhouse, 2005), as a pivitol experience in her spiritual journey, her life would change again. She would enter General Theological Seminary in New York and, at age 61, would be ordained an Episcopal priest.

The Rev. Rosalie Heffelfinger Hall, 79, died Sunday, June 24 in the South of France, where she had maintained a home for many years. She is being remembered as someone who cared deeply for persons in need, found practical ways to help them and engaged many others in the process along the way.

A memorial service will be held on Monday, July 2 at 10 a.m. at St. Mark's Cathedral, 519 Oak Grove, Minneapolis. Bishop James L. Jelinek of Minnesota will officiate. Hall's niece, the Rev. Lucia Peavy Ballantine, who also participated in her ordination service in 1988, will preach. A reception will follow the service at the Walker Art Center, across the street from the Cathedral.

Hall's ashes will be scattered upon the St. Croix River, just as she did for her husband, Ted.

Her ministry and life motto might best be summed up in the "personal ministry statement" on her Episcopal Church Deployment Office Personal Profile: "God's presence brings me healing and growth, whereby problems become opportunities. It's that salvific presence that I feel called to share."

Share it she did!

A pioneering AIDS ministry

Hall was not afraid to tread into what might be difficult territory for some. No where was this more evident that her pioneering ministry to people suffering from HIV/AIDS. As a seminary student in New York in the mid-1980s, Hall was a chaplain to AIDS patients at Bellevue Hospital.

"She ministered to the sickest of the sick, the poorest of the poor and all at a time when many shunned and feared persons with this new, horrific disease," said Tom Kane, a longtime friend and member of St. Mark's Cathedral. Kane and Hall were instrumental in organizing the Diocese of Minnesota's AIDS ministry. Hall was also involved in the AIDS ministry of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis.

Kane says he recalls Hall officiating at many of the early AIDS funerals "offering dignity and comfort to survivors who, otherwise, would have been neglected."

"Her generosity of spirit and self allowed for the growth and success of many local and international AIDS organizations and programs, including The Aliveness Project in south Minneapolis," Kane said.

In 1994, while serving as a canon at the American Cathedral in Paris, she wrote to Bishop James Jelinek to report that she had organized an AIDS support group there.

A philanthropist and fund raiser par excellence

Hall was born into a family of wealth and privilege: the Peaveys and Heffelfingers, owners of what was once one of the largest grain dealing companies in the United States. She was never selfish with her money, contributing generously to many causes. But more than that, she is being remembered as someone who was never afraid to ask others for money, as well -- who could help people catch a vision and step forward.

Hall played an active role in the recently completed capital campaign at Episcopal Homes of Minnesota, where President Marvin Plakut remembers her as a person "willing to roll up her sleeves and dig right in."

"She was willing to do the hard work with a confidence that made people take note," said Plakut. "She always focused on the goal of making a difference in people's lives."

Hall also served on the Board of Directors for the Greater Minneapolis Council of Churches, where her fund-raising efforts helped the Council grow its programs for food shelves and ministries to immigrants, Native Americans, seniors and persons just out of prison.

No where was her philanthropy and fund raising skills more prominent than in a ministry that was very dear to her heart: Episcopal Group Homes, which she helped to found in 1977, along with others from her home congregation, St. Martin's by-the-Lake, Minnetonka Beach.

One of the first things that Episcopal Homes needed, recalls Dexter Andrews, its executive director, was a building that could be converted into a "home" for the developmentally disabled residents. Hall spearheaded the search and within days found "a perfect spot" on a cul de sac in Wayzata. This summer that home is celebrating its 30th anniversary. Hall later purchased a second house for Episcopal Group Homes -- in the Uptown area of Minneapolis -- to provide a location closer to employment opportunities for residents.

Hall left the Episcopal Group Homes board in the mid-1980s, but continued to organize summer trips to Rainy Lake, Christmas parties, and, of course, fundraisers, noted Andrews.

"In today's lingo Rody would be called 'hands-on,'" said Andrews. "If you asked her for something, you'd better be ready to go to work. She brought dreams to life and Episcopal Group Homes is only one example."

Hall once commented on her motivation as a fundraiser: "There's a reason I've been a fundraiser for 50 years," she once told Episcopal Homes. "Down here, where we all live, it takes money to do God's work."

A 'visionary person of God'

The Rev. Rosalie Hall was ordained to the priesthood by then-Minnesota Bishop Robert Anderson on December 28, 1988 at St. Martin's by-the-Lake. Her husband and her three sons who survive her -- Wendel Willie II, Philip Willkie and Frank Wilkie -- all participated in the service. Tom Kane was the lector. Harry Sweat and Harry Tuttle were ushers. The offering went to the AIDS Interfaith Council of Minnesota.

In the Diocese of Minnesota, Hall served a number of congregations as interim rector, including her home congregation of St. Martin's by-the-Lake, where she followed the ministry of the Rev. Ed Eilertsen. St. Martin's current rector, the Rev. Leonard Freeman, says she is remembered for doing a "good job at a key time for the parish." He noted she was both "one of the group," but also "a real priest" who could make the tough decisions.

"Rody Hall was a gracious, strong, creative, remarkable, spiritual person," said Freeman. "A genuine original."

Hall also served Ascension Church, Stillwater, and the Cathedral of Our Merciful Saviour, Faribault, in interim ministry. She was also a chaplain at Metropolitan-Mt. Sinai Medical Center in Minneapolis.

Since 1998, she had served as an assisting priest at St. Mark's Cathedral, Minneapolis, where the dean, the Very Rev. Spenser Simrill, remembers her as "friend to many, many people."

"Rody's honesty, candor, respective and playful irreverence, commitment to interfaith relationships and advancing the possibilities for disabled persons will always be treasured," said Simrill. "She leaves a remarkable legacy as a beloved and visionary person of God."

Howard Anderson, former Minnesota priest and current president of the Cathedral College in Washington, D.C., concurs that Hall had many friends.

"She had friends everywhere," said Anderson. "When we had her book signing here in Washington, under the auspices of the Cathedral College, people from all walks of life came: her college classmates, her children, scholars, bishops, priests, friends from Congress and business. It showed the breadth of her relationships. She was a citizen of the world."

Former Minnesota Bishop Suffragan Sanford Hampton said, "Personally and professionally we have lost a friend and a faithful servant of Christ."
By the time Rody Hall and her now late husband, Ted, sailed down the Mississippi River in a lobster boat in 1984, she had already lived what would seem to many to have been "several lifetimes." She was known and respected as a philanthropist and successful fundraiser. After the river trip, which she recounted in a book, "A River Echoes in My Ministry" (Kirkhouse, 2005), as a pivitol experience in her spiritual journey, her life would change again. She would enter General Theological Seminary in New York and, at age 61, would be ordained an Episcopal priest.

The Rev. Rosalie Heffelfinger Hall, 79, died Sunday, June 24 in the South of France, where she had maintained a home for many years. She is being remembered as someone who cared deeply for persons in need, found practical ways to help them and engaged many others in the process along the way.

A memorial service will be held on Monday, July 2 at 10 a.m. at St. Mark's Cathedral, 519 Oak Grove, Minneapolis. Bishop James L. Jelinek of Minnesota will officiate. Hall's niece, the Rev. Lucia Peavy Ballantine, who also participated in her ordination service in 1988, will preach. A reception will follow the service at the Walker Art Center, across the street from the Cathedral.

Hall's ashes will be scattered upon the St. Croix River, just as she did for her husband, Ted.

Her ministry and life motto might best be summed up in the "personal ministry statement" on her Episcopal Church Deployment Office Personal Profile: "God's presence brings me healing and growth, whereby problems become opportunities. It's that salvific presence that I feel called to share."

Share it she did!

A pioneering AIDS ministry

Hall was not afraid to tread into what might be difficult territory for some. No where was this more evident that her pioneering ministry to people suffering from HIV/AIDS. As a seminary student in New York in the mid-1980s, Hall was a chaplain to AIDS patients at Bellevue Hospital.

"She ministered to the sickest of the sick, the poorest of the poor and all at a time when many shunned and feared persons with this new, horrific disease," said Tom Kane, a longtime friend and member of St. Mark's Cathedral. Kane and Hall were instrumental in organizing the Diocese of Minnesota's AIDS ministry. Hall was also involved in the AIDS ministry of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis.

Kane says he recalls Hall officiating at many of the early AIDS funerals "offering dignity and comfort to survivors who, otherwise, would have been neglected."

"Her generosity of spirit and self allowed for the growth and success of many local and international AIDS organizations and programs, including The Aliveness Project in south Minneapolis," Kane said.

In 1994, while serving as a canon at the American Cathedral in Paris, she wrote to Bishop James Jelinek to report that she had organized an AIDS support group there.

A philanthropist and fund raiser par excellence

Hall was born into a family of wealth and privilege: the Peaveys and Heffelfingers, owners of what was once one of the largest grain dealing companies in the United States. She was never selfish with her money, contributing generously to many causes. But more than that, she is being remembered as someone who was never afraid to ask others for money, as well -- who could help people catch a vision and step forward.

Hall played an active role in the recently completed capital campaign at Episcopal Homes of Minnesota, where President Marvin Plakut remembers her as a person "willing to roll up her sleeves and dig right in."

"She was willing to do the hard work with a confidence that made people take note," said Plakut. "She always focused on the goal of making a difference in people's lives."

Hall also served on the Board of Directors for the Greater Minneapolis Council of Churches, where her fund-raising efforts helped the Council grow its programs for food shelves and ministries to immigrants, Native Americans, seniors and persons just out of prison.

No where was her philanthropy and fund raising skills more prominent than in a ministry that was very dear to her heart: Episcopal Group Homes, which she helped to found in 1977, along with others from her home congregation, St. Martin's by-the-Lake, Minnetonka Beach.

One of the first things that Episcopal Homes needed, recalls Dexter Andrews, its executive director, was a building that could be converted into a "home" for the developmentally disabled residents. Hall spearheaded the search and within days found "a perfect spot" on a cul de sac in Wayzata. This summer that home is celebrating its 30th anniversary. Hall later purchased a second house for Episcopal Group Homes -- in the Uptown area of Minneapolis -- to provide a location closer to employment opportunities for residents.

Hall left the Episcopal Group Homes board in the mid-1980s, but continued to organize summer trips to Rainy Lake, Christmas parties, and, of course, fundraisers, noted Andrews.

"In today's lingo Rody would be called 'hands-on,'" said Andrews. "If you asked her for something, you'd better be ready to go to work. She brought dreams to life and Episcopal Group Homes is only one example."

Hall once commented on her motivation as a fundraiser: "There's a reason I've been a fundraiser for 50 years," she once told Episcopal Homes. "Down here, where we all live, it takes money to do God's work."

A 'visionary person of God'

The Rev. Rosalie Hall was ordained to the priesthood by then-Minnesota Bishop Robert Anderson on December 28, 1988 at St. Martin's by-the-Lake. Her husband and her three sons who survive her -- Wendel Willie II, Philip Willkie and Frank Wilkie -- all participated in the service. Tom Kane was the lector. Harry Sweat and Harry Tuttle were ushers. The offering went to the AIDS Interfaith Council of Minnesota.

In the Diocese of Minnesota, Hall served a number of congregations as interim rector, including her home congregation of St. Martin's by-the-Lake, where she followed the ministry of the Rev. Ed Eilertsen. St. Martin's current rector, the Rev. Leonard Freeman, says she is remembered for doing a "good job at a key time for the parish." He noted she was both "one of the group," but also "a real priest" who could make the tough decisions.

"Rody Hall was a gracious, strong, creative, remarkable, spiritual person," said Freeman. "A genuine original."

Hall also served Ascension Church, Stillwater, and the Cathedral of Our Merciful Saviour, Faribault, in interim ministry. She was also a chaplain at Metropolitan-Mt. Sinai Medical Center in Minneapolis.

Since 1998, she had served as an assisting priest at St. Mark's Cathedral, Minneapolis, where the dean, the Very Rev. Spenser Simrill, remembers her as "friend to many, many people."

"Rody's honesty, candor, respective and playful irreverence, commitment to interfaith relationships and advancing the possibilities for disabled persons will always be treasured," said Simrill. "She leaves a remarkable legacy as a beloved and visionary person of God."

Howard Anderson, former Minnesota priest and current president of the Cathedral College in Washington, D.C., concurs that Hall had many friends.

"She had friends everywhere," said Anderson. "When we had her book signing here in Washington, under the auspices of the Cathedral College, people from all walks of life came: her college classmates, her children, scholars, bishops, priests, friends from Congress and business. It showed the breadth of her relationships. She was a citizen of the world."

Former Minnesota Bishop Suffragan Sanford Hampton said, "Personally and professionally we have lost a friend and a faithful servant of Christ."


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