WATERTOWN — Pandemic-driven anxiety and hardship have prompted Catholics, as well as people with no religious affiliation, to reach out to the Archdiocese of Boston’s media outlets, said Bishop Robert P. Reed, a Swampscott native who is president and CEO of iCatholic Media.
“Our TV mail and communications is way up, so much so that we are triaging and answering much more mail, and we are also seeing more activity through social media and on our website,” he said, adding, “I hear some very heartwarming stories, but there is a lot of anxiety and suffering out there.”
Bishop Reed is the head of a vast television empire serving Catholics all across the world. He said there are 18.6 million households that subscribe to the network’s different systems.
Over the past six to eight years, Bishop Reed has worked diligently to help the network expand to other platforms, including Fire TV, Roku, Amazon, Apple TV and Samsung.
The network also has a “well-narrated” website, www.catholictvlive.com, and an active YouTube channel, both of which are popular overseas with the military. Bishop Reed works in front of the camera. He is a celebrant of the network’s daily Masses. He hosts the game show “WOW: The CatholicTV Challenge,” as well as “House+Home”; the interview series “Inter Nos”; and several short segments on “Blink.”
Bishop Reed has traveled the world recording (and praying) the mysteries of the Rosary, and is a regular co-host of CatholicTV’s signature talk series “This is the Day.” He also serves approximately 68 parishes and schools as vicar general of the west region of the archdiocese, tending to his flock every day as priest and pastor at St. Patrick and Sacred Heart parishes in Watertown.
It all began at Swampscott’s St. John’s School, originally part of St. John the Evangelist parish on Humphrey Street.
“I think I knew I wanted to go into the priesthood when I was about 8 years old,” Bishop Reed said. “I was impressed by the parish priests, and that’s where I first dreamed of being a priest.”
Born in 1959, he is the youngest of five siblings. After elementary school he moved on to another St. John’s – St. John’s Preparatory School. He prepared for
the priesthood at St. John’s Seminary in Brighton and the Pontifical North American College in Rome and was ordained a Catholic priest in 1985.
He has an advanced degree in television management from Boston University’s School of Communications. He was appointed president of CatholicTV in 2005 and was ordained an auxiliary bishop by Pope Francis in August, 2016.
On the ministry side, Bishop Reed’s official title includes “Titular Bishop of Sufar,” which is located in Algeria. He has served in 11 parishes, including Malden, Norwood, Dorchester, Haverhill, Whitman and Watertown. Since March, he is seeing an increase in need, not just in the parishes he serves, but everywhere. Bishop Reed said that prayer intention submissions have skyrocketed, especially as the month of November is dedicated to prayers for the dead.
“The number of names sent in has tripled to 120,000,” he said. “I don’t ever recall that many.”
When the pandemic hit, business at the Watertown television station hardly skipped a beat.
“We were built for virtual Masses as TV has always been our avenue to providing digital church services and Masses for the elderly and sick who couldn’t get to the physical church to go to Mass,” Bishop Reed said. “We didn’t have to try that hard to adjust as we were, in many ways, operating that way anyway.”
What did change for this son of Swampscott was his calendar-packed travel schedule.
“I always did a lot of traveling, but now everything is virtual,” he said.
On a typical day, Bishop Reed finishes a video-recording session with Cardinal Sean O’Malley to create short messages for group distribution. Among the topics discussed during the session was the Catholic Charities organization.
“The demand on Catholic Charities has absolutely skyrocketed as there are so many people who are struggling in so many ways,” he said.
His favorite part of the “job”? Being a humble parish priest for whom the glass isn’t just half full, it’s overflowing at the top.
“My heart really is in the parish work I do,” he said, adding, “I love saying daily Masses and greeting people after church. Right now, we are working on a life-size Disney-esque nativity. It’s the everyday things, everything else, that supports life in the parish.
“I love my life and am fortunate to have been able to do what I’ve done,” he said, “But there is so much more to do.”
Anne Marie Tobin can be reached at itemlive.com.
