Still Making Music After All These Years:
The Golden Jubilee of Priestly Ordination
Of
Fr. Robert Huse, OAR

I walked into the dining room at St. Augustine Priory in Oxnard, California, and found him alone, having his breakfast of unsweetened cereal and low-fat milk. When I greeted him I realized that he could hardly talk. “What happened to you?” I asked. He explained in a very congested voice that he had been to Nazareth House the previous day, where he makes a weekly visit to play the piano and conduct a sing-along for the elderly residents. It seems that he had followed his usual custom of parking the car in Hermosa Beach and bicycling back and forth to Nazareth House in West Los Angeles—some twenty miles distance. It was his idea of “a little exercise.” On the way back to the car, the weather had turned cold and windy, chilling him to the bone and giving him a bad case of laryngitis. I really wasn’t surprised. This was so like the Fr. Robert Huse I had known for so many years—the free spirit, the health and diet aficionado, the man who would always do things his way, even though that often turned out to be the hard way. “Well, I hope you have your voice back tomorrow,” I commented. That was the day when he would be celebrating his Golden Jubilee as a priest—an occasion on which he would certainly be expected to say at least a few words.

I first met Fr. Bob in 1962 when I entered St. Nicholas of Tolentine Minor Seminary in Norfolk, Connecticut. The seminary was my first contact with the Augustinian Recollects. I entered as a high school sophomore seeking an answer to my vocational calling. I took both Biology and Music with Fr. Bob. Norfolk was a small New England town in those days, surrounded by extensive woods. I strongly suspect that Fr. Bob developed his life-long love of nature exploring those woods . . . Of course his being raised on a farm in Nebraska may have had something to do with it, too . . . In any case, he brought back enough live specimens from the woods—snakes, frogs, once even a porcupine—to make our Biology class quite a “hands-on” experience!

But what I especially remember about Fr. Bob from those days, and really ever since, was his being the “music man” of the community. True, it was difficult to associate music with Fr. Bob when you first saw him: he had—and still has—the build of a professional weight-lifter or wrestler. You didn’t want to mess with him! He came, however, from a musical family, where his brothers and sisters shared a love of music and played musical instruments, always serving the Church with their talents. He brought that love for music into focus with intensive summer studies at the St. Pius X School of Sacred Music (sadly, no longer open) in Purchase, New York. At the seminary he taught both choir and keyboard to the seminarians. Some of my most inspiring moments at the seminary were connected with the choir—some 50 strong in the mid-1960s—as we sang at daily Mass, traveled around to neighboring towns for Christmas caroling, and put on a great concert for the dedication of the newly enlarged seminary in the presence of our parents, friends of the seminary, and local officials. Fr. Bob made us practice long and hard, but the results were reason for all of us to be proud. I also took organ lessons from Fr. Bob and ended up organist for most of my time as a seminarian.

Actually Fr. Bob planned two celebrations to mark his 50th Anniversary as a priest: one to take place at Mary Star of the Sea Parish, next to the Priory in Oxnard, where he is currently in residence, on April 21, and another at Holy Ghost Parish in Omaha, Nebraska, where most of his family lives, on April 29. To get from one place to the other he was going by bus—not by bicycle (although he had made the trip by bike before!) The Oxnard celebration, however, had strong reminders of Omaha, since the two main concelebrants at the Mass, Frs. Francis de la Vega, and James Brown, hailed from the Omaha area. Fr. Brown preached the homily, touching at one point on his memories of their respective families in Omaha, the place where the Augustinian Recollects had their first permanent foundations in the United States and where the community drew the majority of its earliest vocations. Augustinian Recollect friars as well as diocesan clergy joined in the Mass which, as might be expected, featured a most impressive selection of music performed by the choir of Mary Star of the Sea with the help of musicians from the neighboring parish of St. Anthony, where Fr. Bob often assists with Sunday services. The Easter Sequence—one of Fr. Bob’s favorite pieces of liturgical music—was included in the liturgical rites.

Following the Mass a reception, sponsored by the local council of the Knights of Columbus, of which Fr. Bob is chaplain, was held in the hall of Mary Star. The hall had been festively decorated and featured calla lilies placed in “pots” made of beautifully carved cantaloupe melons, which the guests were invited to take home. A medley of slides featuring photos of Fr. Bob, his family, and his ministry from the time of his ordination until the present, was projected on the wall during the festivities, and the students from the Priory provided entertainment in the form of humorous dances in traditional Mexican costumes. Fr. Bob, always preferring the informal, asked for food stations to be scattered around the room rather than table seating, so that people would be better able to mingle and visit with one another as they enjoyed the refreshments.

Fifty years of fidelity to one’s chosen vocation is a rare occurrence in today’s world of constantly changing loyalties in both careers and relationships. It is certainly a beautiful and powerful testimony to the true meaning of priesthood to see a priest who for fifty years has steadfastly labored to be “another Christ” through the spiritual services he has generously and joyfully offered to the Catholic faithful, in good times and in bad. Over the course of his priestly life Fr. Bob Huse has served in most of the ministries of St. Augustine Province as teacher, pastoral assistant, music director, hospital chaplain, and whatever other work he was assigned. As he has gotten older, Fr. Bob has handled the sometimes serious bouts of illness that have come his way with the same good humor and selflessness that have marked all of his activities.

During this jubilee year of Fr. Robert Huse’s priesthood, we offer to this very special religious, brother, and friend, our warmest wishes and heartfelt prayers for God’s constant blessing upon him and his work, that he might continue to inspire us through his very unique approach to life, to faith, and to priestly service.

From the Easter Sequence

Christians to the Paschal Victim
Offer your thankful praises!
A Lamb the sheep redeems;
Christ, who only is sinless,
Reconciles sinners to the Father.
Death and life have contended in that combat stupendous;
The Prince of life, who died, reigns immortal.
Speak, Mary, declaring
What you saw, wayfaring.
“The tomb of Christ, who is living,
The glory of Jesus’ resurrection;
Bright angels attesting,
The shroud and napkin resting.
Yes, Christ my hope is arisen;
To Galilee he goes before you.”
Christ indeed from death is risen, our new life obtaining.
Have mercy, victor King, ever reigning!
Amen. Alleluia.

Fr. John Gruben, OAR
Prior Provincial

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