Rev. Justin Clare MacInnis, SFM

1933-2012

January/February 2013

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Fr. Justin MacInnis died on August 11, 2012, exactly 49 years to the day that he was ordained to the priesthood.

Born to a large family in New Victoria, Cape Breton, Nova Scotia, on October 20, 1933, Fr. Justin attended high school in nearby Glace Bay and studied at St. Francis Xavier University in Antigonish, Nova Scotia. Later he enrolled in the Scarboro Foreign Mission Society and completed his studies at St. Augustine’s Seminary in Toronto. He was ordained for Scarboro Missions by Bishop William Power at St. Francis Xavier University Chapel in Antigonish on August 11, 1963.

Fr. Justin travelled to Brazil in 1964 and lived in Itacoatiara, Amazonas, for 18 years. Upon his return to Canada in 1982, he assisted at Sacred Heart Parish in Edmonton for three years during which time he also served the homeless poor at Hope Mission. Returning to Scarboro’s central house, he often travelled to Northern Ontario to serve First Nations communities.

Fr. MacInnis was predeceased by his parents, Donald Allen and Lydia MacInnis, and by two brothers, Linus and Thomas. He is survived by his brothers James Oliver (Melbourne, Australia) and Zane (Truro, Nova Scotia) and four sisters, Joan Crowell (Halifax, Nova Scotia), Karen Hill (Halifax), Delia Buffett (South Haven, Nova Scotia), and Sheila Richard (Edmonton) with whom Fr. Justin resided for the past four years.

The Mass of the Resurrection was celebrated at Sacred Heart Church of the First Peoples on August 15, 2012. Fr. Jim Holland presided at the mass and Fr. Brian Swords, Moderator of Scarboro Missions, represented Scarboro. Both the funeral and the reception afterwards were very simple in keeping with the way Fr. Justin would have wanted it.

A memorial mass was held at St. Anthony Daniel, Fr. Justin’s home parish in Cape Breton, concelebrated by Scarboro Fathers Gerry Curry, Tony Marsh, and Raymond O’Toole, along with six diocesan priests. Another memorial mass took place at Scarboro Missions in Scarborough, Ontario, with Fr. Brian Swords as principal celebrant and Fr. Russ Sampson as homilist. Many former Brazil missioners were in attendance.

Fr. Justin was a regular contributor to Scarboro Missions magazine, writing biblical studies and reflections during Lent and Easter for which he received an Award of Excellence from the Canadian Church Press in 1990.

In one of his articles Fr. Justin said, “...to believe in the resurrection is to affirm that God can realize his kingdom in the human person and can transform human life. It is to believe and hope in a total realization of the possibilities of this present world.”

This was Fr. Justin’s lived theology, one that he lived in his journey among the Indigenous in Brazil, in Northern Ontario, and at the Hope Mission in Edmonton. We are eternally grateful for his missionary example of living the mystery of the Incarnation amongst the poorest of God’s poor.

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