William R. Martin

Rev. William R. Martin, 77, died at the Immaculate Heart of Mary Residence, Tewksbury, Massachusetts on May 9, 2011, after a lengthy illness. He was born on April 22, 1934, in Jamaica, New York, a son of the late George and Anna (Mulvery) Martin.
Fr. Martin is survived by one sister, Ann Marie Cappuccio of Rutland, Massachusetts; by three nephews: William R. Cappuccio of Havre de Grace, Maryland; Michael R. Cappuccio of Millbury, Massachusetts; and Paul Anthony Cappuccio of Rutland, Massachusetts; and by three grandnephews and two grandnieces.
Fr. Martin entered the Oblate Novitiate in Ipswich, Massachusetts, on September 7, 1954, and professed his first vows on September 8, 1955. After studies in Philosophy and Theology at the Gregorian University in Rome, he was ordained to the priesthood in Roviano, Italy, on July 12, 1961, by Bishop Luigi Faveri, Bishop of Tivoli, Italy. He was to celebrate his 50th Anniversary of Ordination this coming July.
His first Oblate assignment in 1962 was to the Oblate College in Washington, DC, where he was a professor until 1986 and served as superior during his last three years there. After earning a Licentiate in canon law from Catholic University in Washington, he returned to Rome where he studied canon law and, in 1968, obtained a doctorate in both church and civil law from Pontifical Lateran University. During the 1980s over the course of two years, Fr. Martin taught two semesters of canon law in the Oblate Seminary in Cedara, South Africa. He was a chaplain and teacher at Rosarian Academy in West Palm Beach, Florida, from 1987-1988 and again from 1995-1996. He spent thirteen years in parish ministry as pastor at Immaculate Conception Parish in Perry, Florida; St. John Fisher Parish in West Palm Beach, Florida; and St. William’s Parish in Tewksbury, Massachusetts. From 2003 to 2006 he was on the staff of the Christian Renewal Center in Dickinson, Texas. In July of 2006 he joined the community at St. Eugene House, Lowell, Massachusetts. Due to failing health, he retired to the Immaculate Heart of Mary Residence in Tewksbury, Massachusetts, in May of 2010.
Throughout his priestly years, Fr. Martin preached numerous retreats to priests, religious and lay people and was a gifted and well-received preacher. He put his knowledge of church law to use in serving the tribunal of the Diocese of Arlington, Virginia, and those of both Palm Beach and Pensacola-Tallahassee in Florida. Because of his expertise in church law, he was elected as a delegate to the Oblates’ 1980 General Chapter, which was re-writing the congregation’s constitutions.