Msgr. Roeten: a tireless priest who loved the poor

   Msgr. Winus Joseph Roeten, a priest of the Archdiocese of New Orleans for 65 years, was remembered as an intellectually curious spiritual leader who never stopped looking for new ways to take Christ’s message of salvation to his flock.
   Msgr. Roeten, who was 89, died May 25 at Chateau de Notre Dame Hospice.
   “One thing he tried to do was to tear down the veil that kept people from being able to see God, to see life as it is, to see the beauty and the goodness of life,” said Father Roch Naquin, the homilist at Msgr. Roeten’s May 31 funeral Mass at St. Matthew the Apostle Church. “Most of his homilies would end with an effort to say that the Eucharist was the heart, the center, of life and (that) we are to do all things to prepare ourselves to be nourished by the Eucharist.”
   Father Naquin, who served alongside Msgr. Roeten from 1966-73 when the two shared pastoral duties at St. Genevieve Parish in Thibodaux, marveled at his friend’s seemingly endless vigor.
   “He would come (home to the rectory) sometimes and just collapse in the chair,” Father Naquin said. “But if somebody would come to the door or the telephone would ring, he would come to life, energized by being and working with the people.”

Charismatic priest

   Born Feb. 8, 1924, in Erath, La., Msgr. Roeten grew up on a dairy farm near Houma, attending Houma elementary schools and Jesuit High in New Orleans. Like many of his peers who discerned an early calling to the priesthood, he attended St. Benedict Minor Seminary and Notre Dame Seminary before being ordained on May 22, 1948 by Archbishop Joseph F. Rummel. His first assignment, as assistant pastor at St. Theresa of the Child Jesus in New Orleans, was followed by a decade of assistantships at St. Anthony, Gretna; St. Francis de Sales, Houma; and at St. Mary Pamela in Raceland, where he was a vicarious coadjutor from 1956-59.
   “He wasn’t only spiritual, he was very good looking and all the little girls had a crush on him. Every time he’d come out in the yard we’d surround him,” said Donna Marullo Dantin, who was a first grader in the fledgling priest’s first Communion class at St. Theresa. Dantin remembered him as the joyful, approachable and Christ-like priest whom the sisters regularly would have to extricate from the children’s embraces.
   “One little girl held onto him so tightly she tore his pocket,” Dantin said.

Lifetime student of faith

   In 1963, Msgr. Roeten assumed his first pastorate at Sacred Heart Church in Montegut. This was followed by pastorates at St. Genevieve; Our Lady of Prompt Succor, Westwego; St. John the Baptist, Edgard; St. Philip the Apostle, New Orleans; St. Bernard and San Pedro Pescador, Florissant; and Our Lady of Lourdes, New Orleans.
   Father Naquin said his time with Msgr. Roeten at St. Genevieve was “a learning experience” for him as much as it was for their parishioners. A voracious reader who became even more so after taking a speed-reading course, Msgr. Roeten would visit the Catholic Bookstore at least twice a week, taking home “bundles and bundles” of books and declaring each volume to be “the best” he had ever read.
   “One time he brought me seven books,” Father Naquin chuckled. “Whatever knowledge he would get from them he would always share it; it would become part of his ministry, part of his life.”
   Msgr. Roeten, Father Naquin said, “was always ready to go to some conference or workshop” and share the resulting insights at both home and church Masses, and by teaching courses that nourished his flock’s understanding of life, the church and God. He called one of his most effective courses “RS-100.”

   “One of his big things was to get people to move from saying ‘no’ to ‘yes,’” Father Naquin recalled. “(The course was designed) to help people turn things around, to accept the reality of the situation, and to see that when you say ‘yes,’ you can deal much better with (it).”
   In the Words of Remembrance before Mass, Msgr. Roeten’s nephew, Terry Power, paid tribute to his uncle’s “never condescending or judgmental” preaching style that always adhered to the teaching, “Whatsoever you do to the least of my brothers.” Power said his uncle could trace back every one of life’s quandaries to the Gospels of Jesus Christ.
   “He had the ability not only to give people fish, but to teach them how to fish,” Power said.
   “He truly understood the human condition,” Power added. “His famous message – about the ‘insanity of us all’ – often confused people at first, but at further explanation it helped so many people to let go and be free to transform their lives for the better (through) moment- by-moment awareness and conscious decision-making.”

Heart for the poor

  Upon his retirement in 1994, Msgr. Roeten began a second career as a volunteer with the Fourth World Movement, founded in 1957 to empower the poor to gain a place at the table with the world’s decision-makers. Msgr. Roeten, the first American priest to join the movement, would spend many years in France, the United Nations and at home advocating for the disenfranchised.
   Inspired to combat the racism he witnessed while working at the U.S. Postal Service in the early 1940s, Msgr. Roeten also was a member of Caritas, a secular institute that was one of the first groups to work inside the Desire Housing Development in the early 1950s.

   “There is no doubt that Winus really saw the face of Christ in the poor; there is no doubt that some of those poor people saw in him God’s love and compassion, a sign of hope,” said Archbishop Gregory Aymond, urging all the faithful to follow Msgr. Roeten’s  “example of humility and simplicity.”
   “It was never about Winus; it was always about God’s Word, about the church, the mission of the church,” the archbishop said. “He was a man who had a very, very big heart, (one that) reflected the heart of Jesus himself."
    In addition to his pastoral assignments, Msgr. Roeten was assistant director of the Confraternity of Christian Doctrine for the civil parishes of Terrebonne, Lafourche and part of St. Mary, chaplain for the Catholic Daughters of America and spiritual director of the Legion of Mary. In 1980 he was named a prelate of honor – or “monsignor” – by Pope John Paul II.
   In 2005 he moved into his sister’s River Ridge home, becoming a frequent celebrant of Masses at St. Matthew and continually reminding congregants, especially the young, of God’s bottomless love for his children.
   “His main idea, always in preaching, was God is ‘our father, our papa, our daddy,’” said Gary Ault, a St. Matthew parishioner, “And the children knew it.”
   Msgr. Roeten is survived by a sister, Marie Power; a brother, Kenneth Roeten; and nine nieces and nephews. Interment was at St. Mary’s Cemetery in Raceland. In lieu of flowers, please send donations to ATD Fourth World Movement, 1941 Pauger St., New Orleans, La., 70116; or Caritas, P.O. Box 308, Abita Springs, La., 70420.