Ronald McEntire is pictured during his last performance at St. Luke’s Episcopal Church in Jamestown. McEntire played a big role at the church, helping to restore an organ and bring in a Steinway grand piano.

JAMESTOWN — For a man who built a life of stability for his children, Ronald McEntire had the uncanny ability to get projects off the ground. Teaching himself to rock climb by using the children’s climbing wall at Midway State Park was proof of that.

“Just because I had a passion for it, he wanted to understand it, so he came out to Colorado and I taught him how to rock climb indoors,” McEntire’s son, J.T., told The Post-Journal. “It wasn’t even me pushing him to do it — I didn’t even know he was doing it at first.

“He would go down to Midway (State Park) and they had this rock climbing thing for kids. He pushed himself to do that. He kept going back and back. He couldn’t get too far up the first time. … It took him, probably, five times to get all the way to the top. He just kept going back trying to push that fear.”

McEntire, who served as minister of music at St. Luke’s Episcopal Church, died July 3 at the Star Hospice House in Lakewood following a battle with brain cancer. He was 73.

According to his children, McEntire was always forward-thinking — a man willing to exit his comfort zone and take on new challenges. He began learning the piano at the age of 7; became the organist at a church during his senior year in high school; and, as an adult, became a certified management accountant.

McEntire earned numerous college degrees and, later in life, became a certified fitness trainer and a senior fitness and pain-free movement specialist.

But McEntire also was a family man at heart, providing for his kids as a single parent.

“It just meant so much to my identity and working hard and to achieve things,” his daughter, Marina Brening, said in a recent interview. “He just gave us all of that stability and just laughter, and he was just so open to us about his life. He’s gay and was raising us in times that it wasn’t as acceptable as it is today.”

‘A LIFELONG LEARNER’

Born in Meadville, Pa., McEntire moved to Jamestown at the age of 14. As a child he met Brian Bogey, and the two eventually performed an organ recital together for the American Guild of Organists.

“We just became really good friends, good buddies through the years,” Bogey said. “I’m going to miss him greatly.”

McEntire attended Houghton College and later the University of Southern California. In 1971, he earned his bachelor’s degree in organ performance.

As a single parent in California, he raised Marina and another son, Jason.

Marina remembers struggling to adapt as a ninth-grader at a new high school. She said her father would sometimes pick her up and the two would “go out of town for the afternoon.”

Often living in the moment, she said her father had a calming presence in her life.

“So many good values he taught us, I guess tolerance, part of all of that,” she said. “Just a caring heart and humor and everything. It just speaks to his open heart.”

J.T., who was adopted by McEntire when he was 7 years old, said his father was “a lifelong learner in terms of religion and philosophy, spirituality in general.”

His father also was “such a giver, overall, a giver to anybody. So hard to pay the bill when we go out to dinner with my dad, even if you’re a close friend. He’s always trying to give way more than anyone would expect.”

COMING HOME

McEntire returned from the west coast and, for four years, was musical director at St. Luke’s. He then went to Christ First United Methodist Church where he served as organist for eight years before eventually returning to St. Luke’s.

“He was a guy who really, really kept living,” said the Rev. Luke Fodor. “It’s a shame that he passed from the world so soon. … He was a good friend of mine, and he was a spirit. Constantly searching, constantly trying to find the next new thing. That, really, I think says who he was, someone who was just searching for life’s meaning. He kind of searched; he tried, basically, every religion he could think of.”

It was during his second stint at St. Luke’s that Fodor believes McEntire found a home and took on new projects. McEntire helped revamp the church’s musical programs and oversaw the restoration of their organ.

He also played a big role in St. Luke’s receiving a Steinway grand piano — funds donated by Tim Pickett in memory of his late wife, Paula.

It was shortly before a trip to New York City to tour the Steinway factory that McEntire learned he had Glioblastoma Multiforme, an aggressive brain tumor that also claimed the life of his son, Jason, years earlier.

Despite the doctors telling McEntire he needed to have a biopsy, he insisted, “I have to be at Steinway on Tuesday to pick out a new piano.”

Marina and J.T. were with their father when he passed way.

“He had such a positive attitude through it all,” J.T. said. “He said, ‘I’ve lived a great life. When we feel the pain and the hurt and the sorrow, it’s because it was good.’ He would say that a lot.”

Marina recalled the different emotions she felt at the moment.

“We were starting to feel like, ‘Who do we tell?’ And then we’re like, no. I remember putting my phone down. ‘Let’s just take a minute.'”

Before he died, Bishop Sean Rowe presented McEntire with the special honor of being named a “Canon” for music as part of the Diocese of Western New York.

In an interview afterward with The Post-Journal, McEntire reflected on his musical career. “What I love best about music is its impermanence,” he said. “A chord is present for the moment it is played, then time moves on to the next chord.”

A memorial service will take place at 11 a.m. Saturday, July 15, at St. Luke’s. Area musicians are invited to join the church’s choir for the service.

A combined choir rehearsal will take place at 9:15 a.m. Saturday, prior to the service, in the church choir loft. The choir will be wearing white tops and black bottoms.

Bogey said the music will reflect the different religions McEntire participated in during his life.

“It will be a potpourri of wonderful music,” he said. “I always felt like he was always searching for the right answers and everything in his life. He was a blessing to so many of us.”

Memorials also may be made to the Canon Ron McEntire Memorial Fund, St. Luke’s Episcopal Church, 410 N. Main St., Jamestown, NY 14701.