Following the sad death of Fr Joe Kendall last weekend, please see below details of the funeral arrangements:

Vigil Mass:
Thursday 3rd September at 7.00pm
St Edmund of Canterbury Church, Oxford Road, Waterloo, L22 8QF.
Bishop Tom Neylon will be the principal celebrant.
Canons of the Cathedral Chapter will lead
a celebration of Evening Prayer at 6.30pm.

Funeral Mass:
Friday 4th September at 12 noon
Metropolitan Cathedral of Christ the King, Liverpool.
Archbishop John Sherrington will be the principal celebrant.

BIOGRAPHY

The sudden death of Fr Joseph Kendall on 8th August 2026, at the age of just 45 years, was a great shock to many in the archdiocese and beyond. Though he had been feeling unwell in the preceding days, no one had cause to think that death was imminent. In Norwich, at the end of June, he had delivered a report on the past academic year at the English College in Valladolid, on behalf of the college rector, to alumni gathered at their annual reunion. A month later, he joined many clergy and faithful on the archdiocesan pilgrimage to Lourdes. He seemed to be happy and content in his priesthood and relishing his work in the formation of future priests. Yet though his life seemed tragically short, the outpouring of sentiment at news of his death bore testimony to a priestly ministry that was fruitful, and a blessing to those who had the privilege to know him.

Joseph Paul Kendall was born in Fazakerley Hospital on 16th October 1980, the first-born child of Paul and Susan Kendall. He grew up in a close-knit family with his sisters Anna and Catherine in the parish of St Edmund of Canterbury, Waterloo. He attended the parish primary school before going on to Sacred Heart Catholic High School in Crosby, where he took A levels in history, French and Spanish. In the autumn of 1999, he went up to Magdalen College, Oxford, to read jurisprudence, specialising in labour and family law.

Although he came down from Oxford with the intention of pursuing a legal career, he decided that he wanted a break from academic studies. Thus, he became a volunteer at St Joseph’s Hospice, Thornton, and he also worked as a care assistant at Nazareth House in Crosby. He discovered that he rather enjoyed working with people in a caring capacity, and he began to question a future career in the legal profession. The corporate side of law certainly held no attraction. During this time, he also began to consider more seriously the possibility that he might have a vocation to the priesthood. He applied to be admitted to seminary formation and was sent to the English College, Valladolid, in the autumn of 2005 to complete the propaedeutic year.

The following year he began his major seminary formation at Ushaw College. He soon settled into college life, forging new friendships as well as maintaining existing ones, and began to make progress very quickly. Not surprisingly he excelled in the academic studies and gained consistently high marks in his courses. By the end of his third year, he had gained first-class honours in the Bachelor of Arts in Theology and Ministry degree from Durham University. The reports of his various pastoral placements, in parishes, schools, hospitals, and even a young offenders’ institution, always commented favourably on his maturity, pastoral sensitivity and adaptability. He certainly needed to be adaptable when, in his final year, he had to transfer to Oscott College following the closure of Ushaw as a major seminary.

He was ordained priest in his home parish of St Edmund of Canterbury, Waterloo, by Archbishop Patrick Kelly on 13th July 2012. Fr Joe’s first appointment was in the Liverpool South deanery, which had recently undergone significant changes with the closure of several churches and the amalgamation of parishes. Thus, he assisted Fr Andrew Unsworth in the work of bringing together the four parishes of Holy Trinity, St Austin, St Bernadette and St Francis of Assisi, in the Allerton, Garston and Grassendale districts of the city, into the single parish of St Wilfrid in 2013. He was transferred, in September 2015, to the parish of St Jude and St Aidan in Wigan, though his tenure was to be relatively brief. In January 2017, he returned to St Wilfrid’s, Liverpool, as parish priest and quickly settled into his new role. He led the parish through the preparatory phases of the archdiocesan synod and the challenges of the COVID pandemic. When the archdiocesan pastoral plan was published in the autumn of 2021, and the deaneries were reconstituted, Fr Joe was appointed as the dean of the reconfigured Liverpool South Deanery.

He probably thought that he would spend the next few years leading the deanery through the changes envisaged by the pastoral plan. However, in the spring of 2022, he was surprised one day to receive a telephone call from Archbishop Bernard Longley of Birmingham inviting him to become the Vice-Rector of the English College, Valladolid. Having overcome his initial shock, he readily accepted the appointment and joined the college staff in time for the start of the new academic year. He soon adapted to life in Spain and quickly became a valued member of the formation staff. Over the next four years he played a pivotal role in the assessment of seminarians undertaking their propaedeutic year, work which he found fulfilling and to which he seemed well suited. As Fr John Flynn, the college Rector, observed at the time of his death, “Joe was a great priest, formator and friend to so many of us.” This seems a rather fitting epitaph for Fr Joe Kendall.

May he rest in peace.