60 YEARS OF PRIESTHOOD

Press, Volume XCIX, Issue 29350, 1 November 1960, Page 19

60 YEARS OF PRIESTHOOD

Monsignor J. Kennedy

The sixtieth anniversary of his ordination as a priest will be celebrated today by the Rt. Rev. Monsignor James Kennedy, senior priest of the diocese of Christchurch. In the absence of Bishop Joyce he is the administrator of the diocese. Monsignor Kennedy’s parents, James and Ellen Kennedy, lived at Invercargill and Greymouth. He went to school at the Dominican convent at Invercargill and at the Catholic Boys’ School, Greymouth. When he decided in 1891, at the age of 12, to enter the priesthood he went to St. Patrick’s College. Manly, Australia. At the time there w’as no seminary for the diocesan clergy in New Zealand. In 1895 he was sent to the Pontifical college of the Propagation of the Faith in Rome, where he graduated with the degree of doctor in theology. The Vicar General of Rome, Cardinal Respighi, ordained him to the priesthood on November 1, 1900. Monsignor Kennedy was ordained almost two years before he had reached the canonical age of 24. He returned to New Zealand in May, 1901. and served as curate at Ashburton for a year until he was appointed parish priest of Akaroa. From 1908 to 1912 he was an assistant priest at the Cathedral of the Blessed Sacrament in Christchurch. There he was closely associated with the first Bishop of Christchurch, the Most Rev. J. J. Grimes. For four years after this Monsignor Kennedy was a parish priest at Methven, which included the present parish of Rakaia, and he prepared for its future development by arranging the building of a convent In 1920 he was recalled to the Cathedral to be administrator. Then Bishop Brodie sent him to the parish of Hokitika. In 1927 he returned to his position as Cathedral administrator. In 1929 he was appointed parish priest of the newly established parish of Beckenham, where he has remained for more than 30 years. The parish now has two new churches, St. Peter’s and St. Martin’s, two halls, a parish school and a convent.