The tragic irony of last weeks double murder in Woodstock finally hit home when relatives and friends of Raymond and Ruth Ann Ritter entered St. Marys Catholic Church there Wednesday morning to attend a funeral mass for the couple.

Many of the same people had walked up those same steps 19 years ago, when Ray Ritter and Ruth Raycraft came to St. Mary`s to exchange their wedding vows.

But until last week, rage and violence seemed like things that happened in places far away from the small town in McHenry County where the Ritters were rearing three children.

That false sense of security vanished, probably forever, when the Ritters became the first recorded victims of a double homicide in Woodstock.

The suspect in their slayings is Richard Church, 19, a hometown hero on Marian Central Catholic High School`s 1986 Class AA state football champions. Church also allegedly knifed and bludgeoned his former girlfriend, Colleen Ritter, 17, stabbed her brother, Matthew, 11, and then fled. He is still at large.

The real depth of this tragedy is that Ray and Ruth Ritter were such loving, caring people, said Rev. Michael Binsfeld, who officiated at the Rittersmarriage as a young priest at St. Marys. It was a sad homecoming when he returned from his Elgin parish to serve at their funeral.

Now Woodstock is like Winnetka revisited after Laurie Dann shot those schoolchildren, Father Binsfeld said. I hear the grade school kids are afraid at night, and parents are taking a second look at the boys their daughters go out with.

Woodstock`s customary peace and serenity were shattered by a bloody rampage early last Sunday morning.

When it was over, Ray, 43, and his 45-year-old wife lay dead in their home. Colleen survived a savage battering and is recovering from surgery in a nearby hospital, under police guard. Matthew recovered from his wounds in time to attend the funeral with his brother, Stephen, 15, who was not home at the time of the attacks.

Woodstock Police Chief Herb Pitzman and his 25-man force, plus 10 or 12 auxiliaries, have been on virtual round-the-clock duty since the first call for assistance from Ritter neighbors.

The city`s resources are being strained to the limit by more than 60 telephone tips to report sightings of Church or the two-tone Dodge pickup truck he might be driving.

All of them had to be checked out, but the identification by a motel clerk in the Wisconsin Dells was the only one that`s been confirmed, Pitzman said. The clerk said Church stayed at his motel last Sunday, the day of the slayings.

Our men are working overtime, extra shifts and on their days off,

Pitzman said.

If this keeps up for two more weeks, the fatigue factor could become a problem, he said. Now that the FBI has entered the case (on a warrant charging Church with unlawful flight to avoid prosecution), our hope is to find the kid soon, or convince him to stop running.

Dennis Anderson, the Woodstock city manager, confirmed that the cost of the manhunt was climbing.

Overtime costs $1,800 a day, Anderson said. ``With a total police budget of $1 million, that clearly could be significant.

`But whatever happens, Chief Pitzman and I wont compromise on police protection. The human toll has been high, too.

The shock waves still coursing through this close-knit community validate Anderson`s opinion. Along with anger, frustration and grief, they could leave permanent scars.

Adding to the sense of anxiety that grips Woodstock is the uncertainty over Church`s whereabouts.

A nationwide manhunt is on for Church, who has not been spotted since he apparently spent last Sunday night in the Wisconsin Dells motel. His parents, grandfather and other relatives have declined offers to issue a public plea for the fugitive to turn himself in to police.

Understandably, there are some hard feelings toward Church, a soft-spoken model student until apparent frustration over Colleen Ritter`s decision to date others transformed him into a young man consumed by rage.

Everybody knows everybody here, Woodstock real estate dealer Tom Harding said. The fact that kids were involved, along with the entire Ritter and Church families, makes it something that directly affects an awful lot of people.

This quiet, far northwest suburban town of 15,000 is noted chiefly for its venerable Opera House, crown jewel of the Woodstock City Square. A magnet for tourists, the square surrounds a picturesque park that seems frozen in time.

Dealing with the unprecedented horror brought on by the Ritter slayings is a top priority for city officials, parents, teachers and the young people who are friends of Colleen, Stephen and Matthew Ritter and Rick Church.

Classmates of Rick and Colleen at Marian Central Catholic were on equally friendly terms with both of them. The football player and the cheerleader seemed like an ideal couple until the last stages of their 2 1/2-year relationship, when Colleen tried to break it off.

Rick`s football teammates on the Marian Central Hurricanes could not help but notice the way that rejection seemed to turn him into a hostile, angry person. Two close friends, Sean Noonan and Jim Garrelts, both sophomores at Loras College in Dubuque, Ia., saw that first-hand during a visit to Lake Geneva, Wis., with Church in July.

Rick`s a nice enough guy, but he could never seem to loosen up,

Noonan said. ``He was drinking a lot on this trip, and when he got drunk, he started shouting about how much he hated women, and especially Colleen for dumping him. He got loud and obnoxious.

``A girl told him to quiet down, and he really went off. We had to hold him back from going after her.

All the way home in the car, he kept mumbling about Colleen and saying, `How could she do this to me?`

Garrelts also had vivid memories of his friend`s temper:

``We were sharing the dressing room with Round Lake after a basketball game, and one of their guys started mouthing off. Rick turned around and knocked him cold with one punch. For someone not very big (Church is about 5 feet, 11 inches and 180 pounds), Rick sure is strong.

`He often told us that his dad would get all over him if he didnt do what he was told. Maybe thats why if somebody told him he couldnt do something, he`d do it just to show them.

Friends agreed that Church was affected when his parents filed for divorce last summer. He did not earn enough credits last year, in his first year at Northern Illinois University, to earn sophomore status, and he began talking of suicide, according to friends.

Ray and Ruth Ritter had no inkling that their daughter`s former boyfriend was at the breaking point. On the last day of their life, they took their youngest son, Matthew, to breakfast at the Woodstock Ice Cream Co., a snack shop where Colleen had worked for two years.

They were going to the Irish Fest in Milwaukee, said Cliff Carlson, the shop owner and a coach on the Little League team managed by Ray Ritter.

Ray talked about what a good time they were going to have.

But while her parents were spending a carefree afternoon, Colleen was confronted by Church, who threatened to kill himself if she refused to resume their relationship. Some friends gathered at her house thought Colleen had managed to calm Rick down before he left the Ritter house, and she hoped he would accept her decision.

The stage was set for tragedy.

The situation apparently came to a climax shortly after 5 a.m. last Sunday, when an intruder entered the Ritter house at 209 W. Greenwood Ave. Neighbors heard a man`s voice shouting, Get out of here! followed by screams.

Church has since been identified by Colleen and Matthew Ritter, along with two young friends who were spending the night there, as the man who fatally bludgeoned and stabbed Ray and Ruth Ritter.

But the picture of Church that will linger longest in Woodstock is a witness` description of his attack on Colleen after he chased her into the street.

He was like a maniac, clubbing her again and again until she stopped moving, said neighbor Chris Gehrke, a witness.

Colleen survived a severe head injury and numerous other wounds. Now her friends, mobilized by Kelly Green, senior class president at Marian Central, are determined to help Colleen, Stephen and Matthew Ritter overcome their grief and get on with their lives.

I could see the love and concern on the faces of the kids while I gave the homily at the Ritter funeral, Father Binsfeld said. ``Now what they all have to do is talk over their feelings with a parent, teacher or their friends. Sometimes kids will only open up to other kids.

The important thing is to let it all out. We`ve seen what can happen, even in a quiet place like Woodstock, when feelings are bottled up until they become uncontrollable.

R W Ritter