[2] After his ordination McGurkin served as the English Editor of the Fides News Service and personal secretary to Cardinal Pietro Fumasoni Biondi, the Prefect of the Sacred Congregation of the Evangelization of Peoples.
He went to Bedford, Massachusetts, as novice master before being sent to Shinyanga, Tanzania in 1954 as Group Superior to Maryknoll’s new mission there.
Edward McGurkin was consecrated a bishop on October 3, 1956, in the Cathedral of St. Joseph in Hartford, Connecticut, by Archbishop Henry O'Brien.
Bishop McGurkin retired to Maryknoll where he was engaged as a spiritual director with Cursillo and involved with Charismatic renewal and other pastoral work.
His funeral Mass was celebrated in the Queen of Apostles Chapel on August 31, 1983, by Bishop John Comber, M.M.