Jesuits to honor 22 jubilarians at July 31 Mass

Jesuits of the New Orleans Province will honor 22 priests and brothers celebrating milestones of service to the Society of Jesus with a Mass July 31 at 3 p.m. at Immaculate Conception Church, 130 Baronne St.

75 years as a Jesuit

Father Jacques L. Weber taught at Strake Jesuit College Preparatory in Houston and was rector at Jesuit High in Shreveport. He served at parishes in Houston.

70 years as a Jesuit

Father John H. Edwards has served as director of novices, provincial, president of Jesuit High School in Tampa and as superior of Ignatius Residence. He was pastor of Immaculate Conception Church in New Orleans. He resides at Jesuit College Preparatory in Dallas.

Brother George A. Murphy lives at Ignatius Residence in New Orleans. He has worked as librarian at Jesuit High School in New Orleans and El Paso and at St. Charles College in Grand Coteau.

Father John F. Schroder served for 23 years as a missionary in Belize. He taught at Jesuit High School in both New Orleans and Tampa and at Loyola College in Montreal. He lives at Ignatius Residence.

60 years as a Jesuit

Father A. Ferdinand Derrera is associate pastor of St. Charles Borromeo Church in Grand Coteau. He assisted with pastoral ministries and taught Spanish at Strake Jesuit  and was pastor of St. Joseph Church, both in Houston.

Brother Walter A. Eckler serves as a house and grounds assistant at Strake Jesuit in Houston. He has worked at St. Charles College in Grand Coteau and as a missionary Palau, a small island of Micronesia.

Father Roland J. Lesseps was a missionary at the University of Zambia and worked as a professor of biology and agriculture in Lusaka. He was a professor of biology and chairman of the Department of Biological Sciences at Loyola University New Orleans.

Father Gregory F. Lucey has worked as a retreat director and as principal and president of Campion High School in Wisconsin. He was vice president for planning and university relations at Seattle University and president of the Jesuit Conference and Spring Hill College. He is president-elect of the Association of Jesuit Colleges and Universities.

Father Thomas J. Tierney was assistant pastor at St. Agnes Church in Baton Rouge, at The Gesu Parish in Miami, at Sacred Heart Church in Tampa, and at Our Lady of Guadalupe Church in San Antonio. He served as a chaplain at Veterans’ Administration Hospital in Hot Springs, S.D.

Father Andrew P. Whitman was a professor at Loyola University New Orleans and the University of Houston and taught at the College of the Holy Cross in Worcester, Mass., and at the Pontificia Universidade Catolica do Rio de Janeiro in Brazil. For 28 years, he was a mathematician for the Vatican Observatory.

50 years as a priest

Father Francis R. Brou has taught at Jesuit high schools in Tampa and Dallas, and he worked as a missionary in Rhodesia. He has served as pastor of St. Rita Church in Dallas and Immaculate Conception Church in Baton Rouge. He is chaplain at Jesuit-Tampa.

Father Kenneth A. Buddendorff worked as the province vocations director and as a campus minister at Loyola University New Orleans, Spring Hill College, Southern University and Jesuit College 

Preparatory in Dallas. He served as director of Our Lady of the Oaks Retreat House in Grand Coteau and as retreat and spiritual director at Ignatius Retreat House in Atlanta. He is assistant director of Ignatius Residence.

Father Francis V. Ferrier is chaplain for the Knights of Columbus and a minister to several nursing homes in Baton Rouge. He was on the Priests’ Chaplain Corps in the Diocese of Lafayette and served as chaplain at Our Lady of the Lake Hospital in Baton Rouge.

Father Leo A. Nicoll has taught at Jesuit High School in Tampa, St. Charles College and at Spring Hill College. He has worked as a professor of history at Loyola University New Orleans, where he was assistant dean of Arts and Sciences. He is associate professor emeritus of history.

Father Robert J. Ratchford worked for many years at Loyola University New Orleans as a chemistry professor, academic vice president and as dean of arts and sciences. He is treasurer for Ignatius Residence.

50 years as a Jesuit

Father Edward B. Arroyo has taught at Spring Hill College and Loyola University New Orleans. He was director of the Research Institute at Woodstock College. He was associate editor of Sociological Analysis, academic dean of cross-cultural initiatives at the Jesuit School of Theology of Santa Clara in Berkeley, Calif., director of the Jesuit Social Research Institute in New Orleans, and the editor of Blueprint of Social Justice. He was a missionary in Paraguay. He is rector at Spring Hill.

Brother Alexander Gussio assisted with making improvements to Jesuit High School in New Orleans, Christ the King mission church in Grand Coteau, Spring Hill College, Ignatius House of Retreats in Atlanta, and Strake Jesuit. He ministers at Our Lady of Guadalupe Church in San Antonio.

Father Paul B. Patin is a retreat director at Our Lady of the Oaks Retreat House and at the Jesuit Spirituality Center in Grand Coteau. He was pastor of Holy Name of Jesus Church in New Orleans and associate pastor of St. John Berchmans Church in Shreveport and St. Charles Borromeo Church in Grand Coteau.

Father Stephen C. Rowntree is a philosophy professor at Loyola University New Orleans. He held the Donald I. Maclean, S.J., Chair of the College of Arts and Sciences at St. Joseph’s University in Philadelphia. He taught philosophy at Arrupe College in Harare, Zimbabwe. He was  the director of the Center of Jesuit Academic Formation in New Orleans.

25 years as a priest

Father Kevin W. Wildes is president of Loyola University New Orleans, where he is a professor of philosophy and of bioethics. He is chair of the New Orleans Ethics Review Board. He worked at Georgetown University as a professor of bioethics, senior scholar of The Kennedy Institute of Ethics and executive editor of the university’s Journal of Medicine and Philosophy.

25 years as a Jesuit

Father R. Bentley Anderson, a New Orleans native, has worked as a professor of history at St. Louis University, and in 2009-10 he held the Loyola Chair in history at Fordham University. Father Anderson is associate professor of African and African-American Studies at Fordham University and a recent recipient of the Fulbright Specialists Award.

Father Steven E. Kimmons is a clinical psychologist and professor at Loyola University Medical Center in Illinois.