From Saving Lives to Saving Souls

September 1, 2026

A firefighter at ground zero on 9/11, Father Tom Colucci’s path to the priesthood was built on a foundation of service and brotherhood

By Scott Warden

September 1, 2026

Father Tom Colucci, pastor of Most Precious Blood Parish in Walden, N.Y., displays his FDNY captain’s helmet before Mass at the parish in August. (Photo by Cindy Schultz)

A 15-year veteran firefighter, Tom Colucci had just come off an overnight shift at his Lower Manhattan firehouse when the call to return came. He made his way back through the Lincoln Tunnel, grabbed his gear and rode the West Side Highway to ground zero with three or four other firefighters crammed into one car. The south tower came down just as they arrived.

“We climbed into the rubble and just started digging,” Colucci said. “There were reports that 40,000 people were missing. Sadly, very few survived, but we didn’t know that. Any kind of void we saw, we went through it, to see if we could find any kind of survivors, any kind of hope.”

The north tower came down during their initial search.

“We heard a big rumble, and we just ran and ran, as far as we could,” he said. “I remember ducking behind a car. It was a giant roar, and then we got up, and we were just covered with all this debris.”

Today, Father Tom Colucci, 70, is pastor of Most Precious Blood Parish in Walden, New York, and chaplain of Most Precious Blood Council 9254. His path from firehouse to rectory is, on its face, an unlikely one — a retired firefighter ordained a priest at age 60. But there’s more to his story than a late-life career change. It’s a case study in what fraternity does to a man, and how a life spent running toward danger can become a life spent running toward the hungry, the sick, the grieving and the dying.

Colucci had already been weighing the priesthood before 9/11, quietly meeting with a vocation director as retirement neared. But the deaths of his FDNY brothers that morning threw life into stark relief.

“These guys — I’m having coffee and donuts with them one morning, and a half hour later, they’re gone,” he said.

What sealed his decision was another catastrophe: a gas explosion near the end of his firefighting career.

“I hit my head and had a blood clot on the brain and two brain surgeries,” he said. “I even received last rites.”

He retired as a captain in 2005, spent seven years in formation at a Benedictine monastery and entered St. Joseph’s Seminary in Yonkers, New York, in 2012. He was ordained a priest for the Archdiocese of New York in 2016.

“It wasn’t like an ‘aha’ moment,” he said. “I kind of had priesthood in my mind when I retired, something 9/11 had solidified. A lot of guys in the firehouse already called me ‘Father Tom’ anyway.”

Father Colucci was encouraged to become a Knight while still in seminary and joined the Order in 2013. In February 2025, he became a Fourth Degree Knight during the historic 125th anniversary exemplification at St. Patrick’s Cathedral in New York City.

“These guys are phenomenal,” he said of the Knights of Council 9254. “They do all the ushering, the security, the repairs.”

The fraternity of the Knights, reminiscent of his years with the FDNY, has become especially valuable since his ordination.

“I’m here all by myself — the only priest,” he said. “I need some fraternity; the Knights are great.”

Grand Knight Gerald Mishk Jr., a retired law enforcement officer, has watched that bond run both ways.

“Father Tom has, since day one here, applied his experiences to the way he shepherds our parish,” Mishk said. “His experiences as a 9/11 firefighter contribute to his compassion. Our Masses are always filled to capacity since Father Tom took over the parish. He is loved by all parishioners.”

There is a straight line between Father Colucci’s two vocations: service.

“As a firefighter, it was a total life of service,” he said. “It’s the same thing as a priest. I’m on call almost every day. I went from saving lives to saving souls.”

*****

SCOTT WARDEN is managing editor of Vibrant Catholic, the quarterly magazine of the Diocese of Fort Wayne-South Bend, and a member of Holy Trinity Council 12741 in New Haven, Ind.

Bronislav Futomskyi, past grand knight of St. Charbel Council 16417, prays in his home in Khmelnytskyi, Ukraine.

From Saving Lives to Saving Souls

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