Robert J. Fox - Life and Career

Life and Career

Fox was born in Watertown, South Dakota on December 24, 1928. His parents, Aloysius and Susie Emma Fox, were farmers. Fox the youngest of eight siblings was raised in a religious family, and he later recalled "I never remembered when I did not want to be a priest." His father died while Fox was still a baby and he grew up working with his siblings to preserve the farm throughout the Great Depression. Before attending school he was encouraged by his mother to study to become a priest like their local pastor Fr. William O'Meara. He attended Immaculate Conception elementary school which was run by Franciscan nuns. There Fox learnt of Padre Pio (whose physical wounds were held by many Catholics to be an example of the miraculous charism of the stigmata) this further inspired him to pursue the priesthood.

Fox then attended Watertown High School. In his senior year he suffered a farm accident with a hay rake which broke his leg and even endangered his life. Recovering from the injuries Fox was removed from farm work and during the reflection and study that occurred at that time Fox solidified his decision to become a priest. After High School graduation Fox studied from 1947 to 1950 at St John's University, an all-male Benedictine liberal arts college and a center of liturgical development in rural Minnesota.

After two terms at Saint John's Fox transferred to St Paul Seminary, there he took classes and gathered with the other students to watch Archbishop Fulton J. Sheen's television program on the Seminary's television set (then a new technology). Fox graduated from Seminary in 1955. He was ordained into the Roman Catholic priesthood on April 24, 1955 in the Diocese of Sioux Falls by Bishop William O. Brady. He went on to serve the Catholic Parishes of Yankton, Milbank, Waubay, Bristol, Mobridge, Hoven, Redfield and Alexandria, in South Dakota.

After being ordained, Fox served as an Associate Pastor in several congregations where his encouraged him to be a writer. Letters and articles he sent to Catholic publications were published and he soon became a weekly columnist for the National Catholic Register and wrote regularly for a number of other publications.

Fox's first assignment was as an assistant priest in Millbank, South Dakota in 1955. He was transferred to Hoven, South Dakota's St. Anthony's Parish in January 1959, by August he was sent as an associate pastor to Yankton, South Dakota's Sacred Heart parish. The new Bishop Lambert. A. Hoch moved Fox to Bristol, South Dakota's St. Anthony Parish in 1961, where he took on the job of main pastor for the first time. In 1965 he was sent to St. Joseph's Parish in Mobridge, South Dakota. By 1969 he returned to St. Lawrence in Milbank. In 1971 he was sent to Redfield, South Dakota's St. Bernard Parish where he served for twelve years.

While Fox was serving the Bristol parish his bishop was attending Vatican II. After the council's promulgation of the Decree on Ecumenism Fox received permission by his bishop to hold an ecumenical Advent prayer with three Protestant denominations, over six hundred attended and news of the event was picked up by the national media, with Fox being called a "new breed" of priest. Responding to the Council's call for a greater commitment to Catholic catechesis, Fox increased his efforts to work with youth. Fox maintained a conservative reading of the documents of Vatican II, but soon encountered those who had a more liberal reading of them which Fox held were watering down the truth of the Catholicism. In response to this he wrote "Religious Education; Its Effects, Its Challenges Today". This was popular among the conservative element within the Catholic Church in America but was opposed by the liberal element. Notably in Milbank were a pastor attempted to implement ideas from his book into a Catholic school and was opposed by the school board and principal. Fox, troubled over the conflict rising from his work, was able to maintain his commitment to a conservative reading of Vatican II with the support of Cardinal Wright. Fox soon found himself defending a conservative position on aspects of the Catholic priesthood including celibacy.

Cardinal John Wright the Prefect for the Congregation for the Clergy in Rome contacted Fox in 1971 congratulating him on his writing and requesting six of his books which he incorporated into the General Catechetical Directory the following year. Encouraged Fox went on to a prolific career as an author of over 50 books. In 2005, he published an autobiography A Priest is a Priest Forever that coincided with his fiftieth anniversary in the priesthood.

In gratitude for the honor of Cardinal Wright's request, Fox built the first shrine commemorating the Virgin Mary in Redfield in 1972. Fox who had always had a deep belief in the Catholic doctrines concerning Mary was inspired by the statements from Vatican II expounding on these doctrines and by the arrival of the Pilgrim Virgin of Fatima statue at the diocese of Sioux Falls in 1974. That same year Fox took his first pilgrimage group on a six-week tour to Our Lady of Fatima in Fátima, Portugal, a pilgrimage site he would return to often later in life often to lead tour groups. Upon returning to the United States produced a tape series for the World Apostolate of Fatima. Fox was very active in promoting Catholic Marian doctrines and established Marian Shrines in many of the parishes he worked at. He served as the editor of the quarterly magazine Immaculate Heart Messenger. In 1975 Fox led a Holy Year Pilgrimage through Fatima to Rome and developed the idea to make a Youth Pilgrimage program to Fatima run like a retreat. This was the beginning of his Youth for Fatima Pilgrimages which traveled there annually in two separate groups divided by gender.

Responding to Pope John Paul's November 22, 1981 encylical Familiaris Consortio, Fox began the Fatima Family Apostolate in 1986, as its first director and editor for its newsletter. He became chairman of a Fatima Youth Seminar in Detroit and founded a youth division of the World Apostolate of Fatima. He also wrote "Catholic Truth for Youth" at this time. Fox also gave many conferences on Catholic Mariological teachings worldwide including at Fatima, Australia, Poland, Syria, Mexico, Italy, and the United States.

During the 1975 pilgrimage in Europe, Fox met Brother Gino Burresi of the Oblates of the Virgin Mary at San Vittorino, Italy. "Brother Gino" had physical wounds that many Catholics held to be an example of the miraculous charism of the stigmata. Fox was deeply impressed with Brother Gino and the two established a rapport, Fox latter wrote a biography about him entitled "Call of Heaven". Travelling to Venice during this pilgrimage Fox visited what is believed to be the crypt of Mark the Evangelist. Fox reported while at the tomb hearing "a voice within" telling him to conduct pilgrimages.

To encourage young men to accept the vocation of the Catholic priesthood Fox created media to assist their decision. With increasing notability due to his work on the priesthood Fox was given permission to use his priestly formation program to personally instruct young men, this endeavor was named the "Sons of the Immaculate Heart" and in 1982 with the encouragement of his bishop and the support of Cardinal Pironio, head of the Congregation for Religious, Fox had seven candidates living with him at his parish in Redfield, South Dakota. At this time Fox also used his familiarity with media to create a catechism course called "Sharing the Faith". He also continued to do his parish work, writing, and lead Fatima pilgrimages.

One of Fox's speaking engagements took him to Moscow where he met the Archbishop of Moscow and the Byzantine Patriarch Archbishop Tadeusz Kondrusiewicz. As a gift to the Russian people, Fox presented the Archbishop a statue of Our Lady of Fatima "with Our Lady's assurance that Russia will be converted and 'In the end, my Immaculate Heart will triumph.'"

In 1984 on a trip to Fatima Fox collapsed with severe pneumonia that threatened his life and destroyed his voice. By Bishop Paul Dudley's order the Sons of the Immaculate Heart were disbanded. Fox was sent to the small parish of Immaculate Conception in Waubay, South Dakota to regain his strength and relearn how to talk. During this period he wrote "Immaculate Heart of Mary" expounding on the work of Louis de Montfort (held to be a saint by the Roman Catholic Church). Fox also built his second shrine to Mary while at Waubay.

In 1985 Fox arrived at St. Mary of Mercy parish in Alexandria, South Dakota and began building a shrine to Our Lady of Fatima on a block of donated land held to be near the center of North America. The shrine expanded to be the "Fatima Family Shrine" and includes "areas dedicated to, besides Our Lady of Fatima and Our Lady of Guadalupe, the Sacred and Immaculate Hearts plus angels adoring the Holy Eucharist as well as Saint Joseph, and the Christ Child blessing the world plus a Divine Mercy Shrine."

In September 1987 Fox hosted the first Marian Congress in America at Alexandria (it was thereafter held annually in June with an average attendance of 8,000). Among the Catholic notables that have spoken at Marian Congresses are Bishop Fabian Bruskewitz, Father John Corappi, Mother Angelica,Father Harold Cohen and Jeff Cavins. In addition Administrating Bishops of Fatima, Portugal have attended the Congresses - Bishop Alberto Amaral (who dedicated the "Fatima Family shrine" in 1987) and his his successor Bishop Serafim S. Ferreira e Silva.

Fox retired to Hanceville, Alabama where he offered daily Mass at the Shrine of the Most Blessed Sacrament, part of Our Lady of the Angels Monastery. In retirement Fox became deeply involved in the Roman Catholic media network EWTN Among Fox's numerous television and radio appearances are several Mother Angelica Live Shows; an appearance on Johnette Benkovic’s The Abundant Life; EWTN Doug Keck's Bookmark; Daily Mass; WEWN shortwave radio and Sirius Satellite Radio; Relevant Radio. He continued to publish and remained editor of the Immaculate Heart Messenger Magazine.

After suffering with cancer for an extended period of time, Fox died in Hanceville, Alabama on Thanksgiving Day, November 26, 2009.