Reverend Michael Sepp, the widely-loved pastor of Sacred Heart Church, died of cancer last month.

Sepp, who was known to the Highbridge community as “Father Michael,”  was diagnosed in January 2008, and died March 13 at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center in Manhattan. His death came two days after his 56th birthday, five days after leading his final mass, and one month after his last visit to Sacred Heart School, where he was a constant presence. According to the school’s principal, Rachel Suarez, Sepp stopped by February 13 bearing Valentine’s Day chocolate hearts for faculty and administrators.

“He was so thoughtful,” Suarez said. “Always thinking of others first.”

On March 16, thousands of mourners gathered at Sacred Heart church for Sepp’s viewing and mass. According to Reverend Joseph E. Franco, the parochial administrator of Sacred Heart Church, the viewing lasted five hours, and when it ended, there were still people who had not yet had an opportunity to see his body; the viewing resumed after the  mass.  During the mass itself, the pews of the church were packed and a standing-room only crowd spilled into the entrance. Auxiliary Bishop Dennis J. Sullivan led a second mass at St. Benedict’s Church on March 17, while Edward Cardinal Egan gave Sepp’s funeral mass on March 18, also at St. Benedict’s church.

According to his obituary in Catholic New York , Sepp is survived by: His mother, Joan Sepp, and father, Elmar Sepp; his three sisters, Eileen and Mary Sepp, and Joan Daley; and two brothers, Alan and E.J.

A Life Centered on the Church

Sepp was a life-long New Yorker; he was born in Manhattan, grew up in the Bronx, and graduated from Queens College.  Sepp then entered St. Joseph’s Seminary, Dunwoodie in Yonkers, where he was ordained in 1982.  From that year until 1989, he was a vicar at St. Rita’s in Staten Island. 

On December 16, 1989, Sepp met with then-Reverend Robert Trainor, who was the Pastor of Our Lady of Angels Church in Kingsbridge.  Our Lady of Angels had just lost a young priest to a church in Manhattan, and needed to replace him.  Sepp and Trainor met that winter day to discuss whether Sepp and Our Lady of Angels were a good fit for one another.

“We talked for several hours, but the decision was made in the first five minutes: Of course we want Father Michael ,” recalled Trainor, now the senior priest at Sacred Heart, during the March 16 mass.

Sepp worked alongside Trainor at Our Lady of Angels until 1992, when Trainor left to become the Pastor at St. Ann’s Church in Norwood.   Sepp would later move on as well; in 1995, he became the pastor at Resurrection Parish in Manhattan. The two kept track of each other’s movements over the years, and were ultimately reunited; Sepp became the pastor of Sacred Heart in 2000, and Trainor later joined him there.

“Maybe in my 30 years as a pastor, I had 18 different assistants,” Trainor said. “But he was the best.”

Trainor emphasized Sepp’s religious dedication in explaining why he felt Sepp stood out. 

“I would say, first of all, his deep loyalty to the church,” Trainor said. “His desire to spread the gospel and devotion to the sacraments to everybody, with a special flair for the young people in the parish.”

Sepp’s friends and colleagues said his dedication to the church was reflected in his work ethic and in his extreme accessibility to church members. Franco said that Sepp rarely took a day off work; that he gave out his cell phone number freely; and that he would drop whatever activity he was engaged in—even eating dinner—to help a church member in need.

“I know [from]living with him, and I mean this in the best sense possible: we came last,” Franco said.

Sepp, whose family works in construction, also worked to improve the infrastructure, accessibility, and aesthetics of Sacred Heart Church, which—— according to Trainor—was built in 1912.  Sepp oversaw renovations to the church sanctuary, the installation of new wiring and lighting, and an access ramp for the disabled.  He also opened a chapel that community members could access at any time.

A Special Focus on Youth

Among the crowd that came to bid Sepp goodbye on March 16 were large numbers of children and young adults.  

The large turnout of young people was not coincidental.  Sepp ran several youth groups over the years, including one that gathered at Sacred Heart on Friday nights and Saturday afternoons for activities including basketball and Bible-themed games. Several people interviewed by the Horizon said Sepp placed such emphasis on young people in order to give them a refuge from the life of the streets.

Several former members of Sepp’s youth group at Resurrection Church in Harlem attended his mass in Highbridge. 

“He had this aura,” said Isham Nunez, 28. “He raised us, basically,” Nunez added a moment later.

Nunez’ mother, Germania Rivera, agreed that Sepp had played an instrumental role in her son’s life.

“He saved him from the street, and emotionally he provided a lot,” Rivera said.

Sepp’s influence on youth continued once he arrived at Sacred Heart.

“There was something about him that the students loved,” said Karina Rivera, an 8th grader at Sacred Heart School. 

Rivera and her fellow 8th graders—Bridget Adarkwa, Brandon Pimentel, and Jonathan Perez—described Sepp as a compassionate pastor who frequently offered them help and advice, and pushed them to work harder.

“He did make us better people,” Adarkwa said. “When you were around him, you weren’t that girl, or that boy. You were Jonathan, or Karina.  You were who you are.”

A Painful Effort To Move Forward

The Sacred Heart community is doing its best to move forward from Sepp’s death.  In  many instances, it hasn’t been easy.  “ My way of coping is not to cope,” said Assistant Principal Abigail Akano. “I don’t spend too much time talking. I’m not ready to deal yet.”

A few seconds later, Akano began to cry.

“It’s been hard,” Karina Rivera said. “It just doesn’t seem like he’s gone. He’s close to every student in Sacred Heart, and faculty.”

Suarez said that when the school reopened after Sepp’s death, the first two days were filled with a mournful quiet. Now, she said, the students, faculty, and administrators at the school are determined to press ahead, while still paying tribute to Sepp’s memory; next month, Sacred Heart will re-dedicate a garden in his name.

“Unfortunately, life has to go on, and we just have to keep going,” Suarez said. “And he would want us to. He was like non-stop.”