“I didn’t know what my future was going to be when I decided to retire,” Father Michael Anderson, who retired on July 1, said. “But I kept thinking, I still want to be able to live out this life I feel called to (priesthood).”
Father Anderson was ordained in 1983 and was first assigned to Our Lady of the Lake in Mound. In 1986, he was assigned to Our Lady of Grace in Edina, then St. Bernard in St. Paul, where he stayed for 20 years until 2015. Father Anderson then served as a priest at St. Joseph of the Lake in Lino Lakes. He said he was graced with the ability to stay in communities for a long time.
The priesthood, as described by Father Michael Van Sloun, the director of clergy personnel for the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis, is a vocation, not a job or a career, and does not end when a priest retires.
“It (the priesthood) is a lifelong commitment,” Father Van Sloun explained. “If a priest retires as a pastor or from another ministry, he does not cease to be a priest. As Scripture says, ‘You are a priest forever.’ See Ps 110:4; Heb 5:6; 7:3, 17, 21, 24. Most priests continue in some form of ministry after turning 70.”
Father Michael Tix, a vicar general of the archdiocese, agreed with Father Van Sloun.
“Priesthood isn’t a career, but a vocation and grounded in the Scriptures of being a priest forever,” Father Tix said. “In this sense, while retiring from active ministry, a retired priest continues to live in the ways of a priest that includes his praying for the Church in the Liturgy of the Hours, celebrating Mass, and other ways that he can fulfill his vocation of service to the Church.”
However, with exceptions, the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis does mandate a retirement age of 75.
“The archbishop can grant permission for a priest to serve in an assignment beyond the age of 75,” Father Van Sloun said. “Early retirement may be granted for medical or other special reasons. Whatever the age or circumstance, the priest sends a letter to request retirement to the archbishop, and the archbishop alone grants permission.”
Retired priests are still able to remain sacramental ministers at parishes as “visiting priests.” Additionally, they can offer weekend or weekday Masses, hear confessions, or preside for a baptism, funeral or a wedding. Senior priests also serve as hospital chaplains, either full-time, part-time, or for occasional coverage, lead pilgrimages, provide spiritual direction, teach courses, and offer workshops, retreats, Bible studies and other programs.
In 2009, Father Anderson was diagnosed with spinal stenosis. In 2022, he awoke one morning and found he couldn’t walk. His previously diagnosed condition had caused this degeneration. After going to the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, doctors offered surgery that had a 50/50 chance of being successful to help him walk again. Father Anderson decided then that he would rather learn to live the way he was.
“There happened to be somebody at St. Joe’s (in Lino Lakes) who passed away, who had used an electric wheelchair, and the family had given it to the parish,” Father Anderson said. “The maintenance guys gave it to me. From 2022 until my retirement in June, I was able to do ministry at St. Joe’s in the wheelchair, but it was limiting.”
While St. Joseph was wheelchair accessible, Father Anderson’s condition made it difficult to go to hospitals, make sick calls and bless houses.
“Things like that were … enough to think, ‘It would be better for me to find a place more handicap accessible.’ It would also bring a new person to St. Joe’s who would be a little bit more capable of meeting all of the needs of the parish, instead of setting them into my limitations.”
In December 2023, Father Tix asked Father Anderson if he’d ever considered retiring. At the time, Father Anderson expected to work another three years, but after considerable prayer, he felt more peace with the idea of retiring.
Father Anderson soon found in the care facilities he regained what he felt he’d been recently missing. Without administrative tasks such as parish financial meetings, Father Anderson said he felt like he could get back to the bare bones of being a priest.
“I have access to anything and everything I need,” said Father Anderson, who now lives in Hastings. “It gives me the opportunity to do stuff that (I) was really limited on doing as a pastor over the last several years. I didn’t realize how much I was missing: anointing people, walking with them in their challenges of life and just being able to be a word of encouragement about that future for us, that future of going home. Coming here, it put me right in the center of everything I was missing.”
Father Paul Jarvis, another recently retired priest said, “The archbishop asks all retired priests to help in whatever way we can. I help with Masses, confessions, funerals and a few weddings whenever I can. I think serving is a form of prayer.”
Father Jarvis currently lives at the Byrne Residence, an independent living residence for retired priests in St. Paul.
“The Byrne Residence is a bit like a daily retreat,” Father Jarvis said. “I find myself being more deliberate in small, everyday things. Less asking for this and that, and more opening myself up to what God has for me … including what God has for me to do in my senior, more medically challenged years.”
Father Michael Skluzacek, recently the director of pastoral formation at The St. Paul Seminary, retired Aug. 1, and is also a resident of the Byrne Residence. Father Skluzacek plans to continue ministry by mentoring new soon-to-be pastors in the Diocese of New Ulm.
“I plan to keep busy,” Father Skluzacek said. “I also plan to do pilgrimages. I’m looking at a pilgrimage to Poland next year and I’d love to travel, so hopefully I’ll be doing some traveling. … I don’t plan to be bored. I plan to keep busy, but not at the pace that I used to work.”
Father Skluzacek plans to say Mass every day and help other priests in parishes who might need his assistance with daily Masses and confessions.
“The generosity of our retired priests in helping at parishes is huge as they help priests in active ministry to get away for renewal opportunities like retreats, vacations, and just being able to attend anything from wedding receptions to their own family celebrations,” Father Tix said. “Our retired priests also help our active priests through their shared wisdom, mentorship, and support — all of which is a great blessing that is much appreciated.”
“They’re as busy as they want to be,” Father Van Sloun said of retired priests. “There’s plenty of opportunities to go out and help. … The ministry of retired priests is greatly appreciated. Archbishop (Bernard) Hebda often speaks of the blessing that retired priests are to the archdiocese, how grateful he is that retired priests continue to serve, and how the spiritual gifts of retired priests continue to enrich the Church. Similarly, active priests and parishioners are deeply grateful for the ministry of retired priests.”
Father Tix explained that in most cases, a retired priest wanting to do parish work depends on individual contacts between retired and active priests and parishes that are most familiar with the retired priests. Father Tix added, “that network is always easily expandable to other priests and parishes wanting or needing help.”
When asked if it’s difficult for priests to retire, Father Tix said, “I can imagine that for some, retirement will be difficult because of a dramatic change in their routine and administrative tasks of a priest serving as a pastor, and for others the change will be welcomed.”
As welcome as retirement may be, Father Van Sloun said there’s too great a love for the priesthood for it to end at retirement.
“It’s part of their blood,” Father Van Sloun said. “The Church teaches that it actually changes your character. There’s an indelible mark on your character, the priesthood is. Baptism is too, but you’re not a priest just when you ‘go to work.’ It’s amazing when you’re ‘off duty’ how much ministry you still have an opportunity to be able to do. Right now, I go walking through the grocery store and somebody recognizes me as a priest and oftentimes comes over and says, ‘Can you give me a little advice on this or that?’ … Bishop (Fulton) Sheen was really a great, prominent bishop in the ‘60s and ‘70s. He said priests don’t have office hours.”
Currently in the archdiocese, there are 13 priests over the age of 70 who are serving as pastors and three serving as parochial administrators. Five priests retired in the last year. Fathers Kenneth O’Hotto and Terrence Hayes also retired as of this publication (see page 6).
