Retired parish priest, a ‘good man’ and ‘friend,’ continues to serve

By Tanya Connor | The Catholic Free Press

Remember retired priests – with financial support and continued contact. After all, they’ve served their people well – in an around-the-clock vocation.
A retired religious education director made those points – and raved about one of her pastors, as the Ash Wednesday collection approached. At Masses on Feb. 14, parishes in the Worcester diocese are to collect contributions to help support retired priests.
“They’re still priests. ... That’s why this retirement fund is so important,” noted Terry Ann Renaud, who worked for different priests during her 30-some years as director of religious education at St. Roch Parish in Oxford. In 2022 she gave notice of her own retirement to her most recent pastor, Father Michael J. Roy, 76, now retired himself.
“He’s an example of what priests do every day,” she said. “They are priests 24-7. They’re there for our needs. It’s our turn to be there for their needs. Don’t forget them; they need a card ... a letter. ... When they retire, they lose a big piece of their daily life.”
Father Roy’s daily life involved being there for people – and it still does.
“He’s more than just a priest; he’s a friend,” Mrs. Renaud maintained. “He plays cards with friends,” family is important to him, he is “just a real, good man, somebody that you could talk to about anything.”
She recalled a personal encounter that demonstrated his approach.
“When he arrived at St. Roch [in late June of 2011], it was the day we buried Msgr. [Louis R.] Piermarini,” the outgoing pastor, who had been sick, she said. Soon after that, Father Roy, the new pastor, came into her office. Wondering if he was coming to say her ministry there was over, she stood and offered him a chair, but he told her to sit down.
“He took both my hands and said, ‘So, how are you doing?’” she recalled, noting that he understood she had just lost her pastor. The new pastor “was here to check on his people.”
Father Roy traces his priestly vocation back to St. Stephen Parish in Worcester, when he was 5 years old.
“I just felt that was what I wanted to do,” he explained.
He focused more on becoming a priest after his family moved to Our Lady of the Angels Parish in Worcester when he was in second grade, he said. He admired the priests there and attended the parish grammar school, where the teachers – Sisters of Notre Dame de Namur – encouraged vocations.
As an eighth-grader, Father Roy said, he applied to the Franciscan Friars of the Atonement (Graymoor Friars) in New York, since the Worcester diocese did not send boys to minor seminary. He was with the Graymoor Friars for high school and beyond, but completed preparation for priesthood with the Worcester diocese. He said he made the switch because religious communities were to return to their original charisms (the Graymoors’ was ecumenism) and “I pictured myself as a parish priest.”
And that’s what he was, from his ordination on Dec. 8, 1975 until his retirement last year.
“I loved being a parish priest,” Father Roy said. He figured such a priest “helps to keep the home fires burning – his ministry is carried out where people live.”
“Each parish flourished under him,” Mrs. Renaud said.
Father Roy returns to his former parishes. Last week he concelebrated funerals for people who were his parishioners at Sacred Heart of Jesus Parish in Webster, and he prays in the adoration chapel there, he said.
He said he still participates in two faith-sharing groups he formed at St. Roch’s as pastor there: a Light of the World retreat follow-up, and a men’s Scripture reflection gathering.
He also continues meeting weekly with members of the Fraternity of Priests in Rhode Island, since there is no longer one of these clergy formation and support groups in the Worcester Diocese, he said.
On Sundays, he concelebrates Mass at Our Lady of the Angels. It’s across from his new home, Goddard House in Worcester, a supportive independent living facility. Weekdays, he participates in Mass from the pews.
Father Roy said he no longer celebrates the diocesan television Mass as he did monthly for three decades. He got a taste of that ministry’s reach when, in a grocery store in Gardner, he was asked, “Aren’t you the TV priest?”
“I’m amazed how many people watched the TV Mass,” he said.
He said he also stopped celebrating Mass at Problem Pregnancy in Worcester.
“It was getting taxing for me,” explained Father Roy, who has walking difficulties.
“I’ve adjusted to being retired,” he said. “It gives me plenty of time to pray and read. I have Jesus sitting over there in the chair [pictured in an icon]. So, we talk.”
Does he talk to the Blessed Mother, whose image is next to the icon?
“Oh yes!” Father Roy responded enthusiastically. “Mama de Guadalupe.”
He’s active in ministries too. He said he hears confessions and does counseling for fellow residents of Goddard House and hopes to continue hearing confessions and giving talks on Cursillo weekends. He’s still chaplain for the Serra Club of Southern Worcester County, which promotes vocations, and Visitation House for pregnant women and new mothers.
Now he celebrates Mass at Visitation House twice a month instead of monthly, said Rebecca Urban, executive director.
“That’s been a treat for us, and we’ve had a lot of babies baptized by him,” she said. He’s good about “sharing the joy of the Catholic faith. ... One of the things I appreciate about him – how much he loves being a priest. It’s evident not only when you speak with him, but in his actions, the way he interacts with people.”
“I’ve been very fortunate; I’ve been able to do with my life what I wanted to from the get-go,” Father Roy said. “Still doing that.”