After 36 years, Father Bill Henry retired from full-time priesthood. Retirement, however, did not slow him down as he is arguably just as active at 79 years old, serving at St. Alphonsus Catholic Church and actively hosting workshops across the U.S. helping people overcome wounds of all kinds.
“I do a lot of ministry on the road,” Henry said. “I just did a workshop in Billings, Montana. I’m affiliated with a lot of things that keep me busy.”
St. Alphonsus hosted a Mass of Thanksgiving for Henry’s 40 years of ministry last Sunday.
His career path did not begin behind a pulpit; instead, it began involving cars.
“I worked in the car industry for 15 years,” he said. “I began my career with American Motors, then I went to Nissan where they sent me to Houston, Texas. We changed our offices to Dallas and I became a district manager for Mississippi and Louisiana.”
Henry was successful in the car industry. He had 18 dealerships located in Louisiana and each of them broke sales records before he left the company.
“I thought I had the best job in the entire country working for Nissan. I had no other goals, and the boss kept pushing me up,” he said. “For me, that has always been a sign. If I lose my goals and nothing is there for me, I know something else is coming.”
But he made the decision to leave the company even when sales were breaking records.
“I had a conversion experience,” Henry recalled. “I was coming back from a conference and a priest was staying in the house where I was at, and he told me he thought I was called to a religious life.”
Those words from the priest stuck not only in Henry’s mind but his heart.
“It was like a thorn in my heart. I couldn’t let it go. This went on for three straight days. I remember going down to Alexandria, Louisiana, to help put in a new dealership and feeling so much hassle in my heart.”
Henry was raised Catholic and his parents were devout. The self-described goal-oriented priest knew what he needed to do, but he also knew he needed help from the Lord if he was going to make such a change in life.
I was around 33 when I went into ministry,” he said. “I said, ‘Lord, if this is what you want me to do, I’ll do it, but you have to pave the way.’ He did it.”
Henry made the decision to sell his home and enroll in seminary. He enrolled in the Sacred Heart School of Theology in Wisconsin, nearly 1,000 miles away from his home in Tickfaw, Louisiana, with nothing but a new car and contents he was able to fit in it.
“I remember going up the road from my house in Tickfaw, La., that I sold. I had my car and what was in it, but I felt like a millionaire,” he said. “I had never had that feeling before. I had no worries in the world. I knew there was no doubt it was my calling. Throughout seminary, the Lord just kept speaking to me.”
Traveling was nothing new to Henry. He was born in Orlando, Florida, then raised out west. He lived in Washington and spent time in both Montana and California.
Throughout seminary, he never had to worry, he said.
“I had a second mortgage, and God made a way so I had enough money all through seminary,” Henry said.
After graduating from seminary, Henry made the 900-mile trip back to Mississippi, where he was ordained in Jackson.
“I was ordained at St. Therese Catholic Church in Jackson in 1984. From there, they put me in vocational work and I was a chaplain at St. Joseph Catholic School. That kept me busy,” Henry laughed.
He became a part-time administrator at St. Anne’s in Carthage before his first pastorship at St. Alphonsus in McComb, which lasted more than a decade.
“This was my first pastoral position,” Henry said. “I was here for 11 years, then I went back to St. Therese for three years.”
Despite leaving, Henry has always loved the Southwest Mississippi flock.
“I always loved this community. People say that your first pastorship is the best, and I can honestly say that it was. I loved it in McComb and hated when I had to leave,” he said.
Henry served for a few years at St. Therese, when the Lord began pushing him to take on another challenge near the Delta.
“After three years at St. Therese, I went up to Greenville to St. Joseph. Nobody wanted to take the job,” Henry said. “But I felt a tug on my heart. It was on Thanksgiving Day, I went and told the bishop that I would take it since nobody else seemed to want to.”
Henry learned that St. Joseph Catholic School was in a large amount of debt, providing him a challenge — or a goal — of assisting them.
“They had a high school that had a $5 million debt when I got there. I stayed there for eight years, and the beautiful thing is, when I left there was no debt. Every parish I’ve been to, there was some sort of debt, but I’ve left with no debt.”
St. Joseph was Henry’s final full-time ministry stop. He said he had a few options, but a phone call led him back to McComb and his first pastoral home.
“When I retired, I had different places I could go to, but I got a call from Mike Brown here at the church and he told me to get down here,” Henry said.
He understood this was yet another tug from the Lord, directing him where he needed to go.
“Everything was at the right time. We started looking at rental homes, and I thought it was crazy, so we started looking at houses. The second one I walked in I just knew it was it and it was mine forever,” he said.
Henry still helps at St. Alphonsus, but he often travels the area and various states speaking at workshops.
“I’m part of the Marian Servants,” he said. “I was one of the first people to go through their program. I’ve been working for them for over 25 years. We have several communities around the state and surrounding states.
“I also do a lot of work with a Christian psychologist, her name is Janet Constantine. We do workshops together.”
Their workshops often deal with those dealing with trauma while presenting God’s love for people.
“It is all about forgiveness and love. We see miracles happen,” he said. “People carry a lot on their shoulders and they don’t know how to just give things over to the Lord. People are stuck and we try to help them get unstuck.
“We have met ladies who have had abortions and lived with that for 20 or 30 years of their lives, and they were miserable,” he said. “When we were in Billings, we saw people that were hung up on lies in their lives. Woundedness and abuse, especially abuse, can affect someone’s entire life.”
Henry said what fulfills him the most through the ministry is seeing people overcome things hindering them.
“When we talk to them, and you see a release of guilt and shame, it is beautiful to see,” Henry stated. “People carry a lot on their shoulders and they don’t know how to just give things over to the Lord. People are stuck and we try to show them how to get unstuck.”
When asked what he would say to anyone who felt overwhelmed by life, it was an easy answer.
“You have to talk to someone. Get to the feelings, the hurt, the wound of the matter. People get lonely and need support. They need to be helped out of that low place. I believe a good, solid psychologist will help, too,” Henry said.
Even nearing 80, Henry shows no signs of slowing down, referencing that moment when the Lord first tugged at his heart.
“Everything that happened over 40 years ago, that was the spark of my life,” he said.
