Father M. Ignatius Curzydlo, SAC, who served for 25 years as chaplain of the Canandaigua VA Medical Center, died Feb. 27, 2011, at the Sisters of St. Joseph Motherhouse in Pittsford. He was 98 years old.
Father Curzydlo was a native of Poland. In 1939 he was ordained a priest in the Society of the Catholic Apostolate, also known as the Pallottines. Over the next 10 years he ministered in Brazil, Connecticut and Maryland. In 1949 he was appointed rector of a new Pallottine community in Buffalo, and in 1962 he became chaplain at Buffalo’s VA Hospital where he would serve for the next 16 years. In 1977 he hosted a visit to Buffalo by fellow countryman Cardinal Karol Wojtyla, who the next year would become Pope John Paul II.
In 1978 Father Curzydlo moved to Canandaigua where he became full-time chaplain at the VA Hospital, remaining there until his retirement in 2003. He moved to the SSJ Motherhouse in 2006.
Father Curzydlo’s funeral Mass was held March 7 at St. Mary Church in Canandaigua. Interment was set for Calvary Cemetery, Canandaigua.
