Torkom Hagopian; organized Armenian school, culture center

Because of Father Hagopian, there is the Armenian Cultural and Educational Center and the St. Stephen’s Armenian Elementary School, which started in 1984 with seven students and now educates more than 200.

Those are just two of Father Hagopian’s gifts to one of the country’s largest Armenian congregations. His outreach touched Armenians in both America and abroad.

“Dad was a religious servant,’’ said his daughter Sonya, of Lexington. “He was a man of faith and taught us to have faith. He had a heart of mush and so big, he had much love for everybody.’’

Father Hagopian, who not only cared for his congregants’ spiritual needs but also helped them through crises, died Thursday of respiratory failure at Lahey Clinic in Burlington. He was 86 and lived in Waltham.

“Father Hagopian was a great pastor and Armenian patriot, a man who loved his family, his faith, and his homeland,’’ Joseph P. Kennedy II, chairman of Citizens Energy Corp., said in a statement.

As a congressman, Kennedy had worked with Father Hagopian on Armenian causes.

A spokesman in Kennedy’s office recalled the key role Father Hagopian had “in organizing church and community support of Armenia in its struggle to emerge from the shadow of the Soviet empire.’’

He recalled how Father Hagopian organized relief efforts during the winter of 1993 “when Armenia ran short of food, fuel, and medical supplies because of the blockade of Turkey and Azerbaijan. And, that he was a stalwart advocate of forcing recognition of the Armenian genocide by the Ottoman Turks.’’

“At a time of great difficulty for Armenia,’’ Kennedy said, “he was enormously helpful in organizing relief aid and raising public awareness of the humanitarian crisis. My heart goes out to his family as well as the St. Stephen community that he loved so much. We will all miss him terribly.’’

At the Armenian school, he started to preserve and pass on Armenia religion, culture, and language to a new generation. Houry Boyamian, principal for 21 years, said that the school “was the dream of the community, and he made it possible.’’

It was he who propelled the grassroots fund-raising. Proof of the school’s success, she said, is the fact that in the Boston area, “our students always are in the top 10 percentile’’ in comprehensive school testing.

The Rev. Antranig Baljian, current pastor of St. Stephen’s, could not recall “Father Torkom saying ‘no’ to anybody when they were in need.’’ Some 2,000 congregants are affiliated with the church, he said.

During his years there, Father Hagopian conducted more than 900 weddings and 1,300 christenings, his daughter said.

Aram Kaloosdian, of Belmont, a lawyer and longtime friend of Father Hagopian, recalled that when war upheavals in Lebanon and Iran in the 1970s and 1980s resulted in a wave of immigration of Armenians to this country, “Father moved quickly to bring into the fold the large number of new families,’’ he said.

“Some pastors take care of their congregations. Father Torkom was concerned with the entire community, not just his own church,’’ said Anthony Barsamian, a Wellesley friend.

Father Hagopian was born in Garmooj in Edessa, now Urfa, in southeastern Turkey. When he was 3 months old, his parents moved to Syria, first to Aleppo and then to Arap Poonar. He dreamed of becoming a priest as early as age 7, his daughter said.

After his father’s premature death, the family moved back to Aleppo, where the teenaged Torkom studied, both general subjects and carpentry, at the Gulbenkian Technology School, receiving his diploma in 1941.

He was blessed with a tenor voice worthy of the opera, his daughter said, and became a member of the choir of St. Gregory the Illuminator Church in Aleppo, Syria,

In 1947, he received the right “to wear the deacon’s stole’’ from the prelate of Aleppo, his daughter said. In 1953, the family moved to a suburb of Beirut.

In 1954, he married Yeretzgin Zevart (Terterlan).

In 1956, he was ordained sub-deacon and then deacon, and the next day, he was ordained a priest at St. Neshan Cathedral in Beirut. That same year, he was assigned to northern Syria, where he became the priest of Hassicheh and environs.

In 1959, he returned to Beirut to leave for the United States, but, his daughter said, because he did not receive his visa in time, he stayed in Beirut for a year in charge of the St. Vartan Church “in the Armenian refugee shelter, Tiro Camp.’’

In 1960, Father Hagopian’s Beirut prelacy sent him to the United States, specifically to parishes in upstate New York, to administer to the growing number of Armenian immigrants in this country. “My parents and my two older sisters arrived with the clothes on their backs and a limited amount of money,’’ Sonya said.

In 1962, his prelacy sent him to St. Stephen’s Church in Watertown.

When Father Hagopian was honored on his retirement in 1995, he said the honor belonged to “the Holy Armenian Church, one of whose humble and dedicated servants I have been. . . . Priests serve and they pass on. Only the Church is lasting and permanent. Only the Armenian nation is eternal.’’

Father Hagopian gave his last homily at St. Stephen’s on Aug. 16, the feast day in the Christian calendar of the Assumption of Mary, his “favorite feast day,’’ his daughter said.

“My message to all mothers is this,’’ he said. “God has given you such a special gift; he has entrusted you with the ability to love and nurture your family, to help them blossom. Blessed mothers, like Holy Mary, may you always be a fountain of light and strength for your family and nurture your family with faith, serenity, and peace.’’

In addition to his wife and daughter, Father Hagopian leaves two other daughters, Zovig Kanarian and Noushig, both of Lexington; a brother, Hovsep of Watertown; and six grand- children.

Funeral services will be held at St. Stephen’s at 10 a.m. today. Burial will be at Mount Auburn Cemetery in Cambridge.