The Rev. Alphonse Mascherino, 69, who left the Roman Catholic Church and founded a nondenominational chapel to honor the victims of hijacked United Airlines Flight 93, has died of cancer.
He died Friday at a hospice in Somerset, Pa.
Mr. Mascherino bought a former Lutheran church and converted it into the Flight 93 Memorial Chapel, in honor of 40 passengers and crew killed when the hijacked airliner crashed near Shanksville during the Sept. 11 attacks.
At the time, Altoona-Johnstown Bishop Joseph Adamec said Mr. Mascherino's work was commendable but not compatible with his Catholic priesthood.
