Richard McHenry

Funeral services for Richard E. McHenry will be conducted at 2 p.m. Tuesday, September 5, 2023 at St. Mary the Virgin Catholic Church, 1408 N. Davis Drive, Arlington, TX 76012 with  Father Stainbrook, Father Wooten and Father Kennedy officiating. Serving as pallbearers will be Dale Williams, Brad Mead, Rod Barber, Joe LoPalo, Wes Ellis, and Tommy Forsythe. Interment will take place at 9 a.m. Monday, September 11, 2023 at Woodlawn Cemetery in Independence, Missouri.

A Rosary and visitation for family and friends will be held from 6-8 p.m. Monday, September 4, 2023 at Rosser Funeral Home.

Richard E. McHenry, a beloved former priest, went quietly to be with the Lord on August 24, 2023. He had served The Church of the Holy Comforter, Anglican, in Cleburne as rector for 13 years but had joined St. John Vianney Catholic Church in Cleburne after his retirement.

He was born in Tucson, Ariz., on April 2, 1932, the only son of Alfred Earl and Mary Virginia McHenry. When he was only one year old, the McHenry family moved to Independence, Mo to be with extended family during the Great Depression. His great-grandfather had donated land for his two-room school and for the Methodist church, which he attended.

By a twist of fate, there was a bitterly cold Sunday when the furnace had been out all night, and the youth were advised to attend a church of their choice that day. McHenry was intrigued by architecture, so he chose the Victorian Gothic-style Presbyterian Church.

That church had a robust youth church. It mimicked the leadership of the regular church and even offered a chance to take a trip. McHenry took advantage of all the attributes, including conducting a Bible School for children. In 1946, he encouraged his parents to attend, and the three of them were baptized on the same day.

McHenry graduated from William Chrisman High School in Independence, MO., in 1948,and attended Kansas City Junior College. He then enrolled in Missouri Valley College in Marshall, MO., as a philosophy major and learned Greek on the side, from an Episcopal priest, graduating in 1954.

That summer, he served as a lay assistant at the Presbyterian Church retreat in Brookfield, IL before enrolling in McCormick Seminary in Chicago, IL. During summers there, he worked in the Presbytery of Kansas City, KS., helping start new congregations through the church's Town and Country Mission Program. He also served as lay minister to two older churches in small towns.

After graduation, he was asked to become pastor of First Presbyterian Church in Brookfield. But he was being drawn to the Episcopal Church. There was an avenue to enter the priesthood by becoming a lay assistant. He became an Episcopal priest in1967 at Grace Church in Carthage, MO.

In 1981, he received a call from All Saints Episcopal Church in Fort Worth, where he served for 10 years. He came to The Church of the Holy Comforter in Cleburne in 1991. Upon his retirement in 2004,he affiliated with St. John Vianney Catholic Church in Cleburne.

At the end of his life, McHenry was attended by his devoted caregiver, Angie Guerra, and members of her family. Since he had no relatives nearby, his friends John Strange and Dale Williams assisted with business matters.

McHenry is survived by his second cousins, Kent and David Werremeyer.