Decorated chaplain, simple parish priest, Msgr. Roy Peters was 58 years ordained
By Patrick Downes
Hawaii Catholic Herald
Msgr. Roy V. Peters, a decorated U.S. Army chaplain and Vietnam War veteran who spent the past 16 years serving as a parish priest in Hawaii, died at Tripler Army Medical Center on July 2. He was 81 years old and a priest for 58 years.
His funeral is July 14 at Sts. Peter and Paul Church in Honolulu. Visitation will start at 4 p.m. Bishop Larry Silva will preside at the Mass at 7 p.m. Jesuit Father David Travers, pastor of Sts. Peter and Paul, will preach. Msgr. Peters ashes will be interred beside his parents’ graves in Sacramento, Calif.
Msgr. Peters began his priesthood in parishes in his home diocese of Sacramento. He later joined the U.S. Army chaplaincy corps for a military career that lasted 26 years, during which time he served with paratroopers in Vietnam, Green Beret special forces in Thailand, Laos and Vietnam, and infantrymen in Vietnam.
He returned to parish work after he retired from active duty.
Msgr. Roy Peters was born on Aug. 30, 1924, in Sacramento. He studied for the priesthood at St. Joseph College in Mountain View, Calif., and at St. Patrick Seminary in Menlo Park, Calif. He was ordained a priest for the Diocese of Sacramento in its Cathedral of the Blessed Sacrament on June 12, 1948.
Msgr. Peters spent the first 12 years after ordination as a parish priest, taking time between 1954 and 1957 to enlist in the California National Guard.
He joined the Army as a chaplain in 1960, going first through basic training and then airborne training in preparation to be a paratrooper chaplain with the 101st Screaming Eagles Division out of Fort Campbell, Ky.
Msgr. Peters spent most of the years 1965 to 1970 in Okinawa, Thailand, Laos and Vietnam where his battlefield ministry earned him six bronze stars, a Purple Heart, three meritorious service medals, a commendation medal, three Legions of Merit, and numerous other honors.
From 1970 to 1973, he was assigned as a chaplain at Fort Meyer and Arlington National Cemetery in Virginia. The monsignor also served two assignments as a hospital chaplain at Tripler Army Medical Center in Honolulu, 1973-1977 and 1983-1986.
He retired from active duty in 1986 and returned to Sacramento where he worked as a pastor until 1990. He came back to Hawaii in 1990 to be pastor of Sts. Peter and Paul Church and then as its associate pastor from 1993 to the present.
Illness sent him about a month ago to Tripler, the same hospital in which he had walked the halls as a chaplain.
In an interview in the Aug. 3, 1984, Hawaii Catholic Herald, Msgr. Peters described his work there.
“I make it a point to go through every ward, every day,” he said. “I stop and talk to every patient, and then I just keep moving. When I come across someone who is really hurting, I spend more time there, and make sure I keep coming back on a regular basis.”
“You have to care about the individual person and not just what you’re doing,” he said. “It’s important for people who are sick to realize that the people taking care of them really care.”
Father Travers, who worked closely with the monsignor at Sts. Peter and Paul Church for the past dozen or so years, summarized his friend’s priesthood as simple, basic actions:
“He was always available. He would never say ‘no.’ He just took care of the people.”
“He was generous with his time,” he said. “His time was anybody else’s.”
Msgr. Peter’s joyful spirit affected everyone, Father Travers said.
“When he came into the church, the church always sparkled a little more. You just knew everything was right.”
The pastor said the late monsignor’s kindness was extended to those he did not know and who would never know him. At the request of a local mortuary, Msgr. Peters performed committal services for Hawaii’s unclaimed dead, offering interment prayers for those who died with no family and friends to mourn them.
When he marked the 50th anniversary of his ordination in 1998, the monsignor didn’t want a party, Father Travers said. He just wanted to go home to Sacramento and celebrate Mass at the gravesite of his parents, which he did, on a little table in the open air. He then took the Hawaiian flowers Father Travers had sent him, divided them up and placed them on his parents’ graves and on the graves of his priest classmates who never made it to 50 years.
“He did things like that,” Father Travers said. “He was a very, very thoughtful man.”
Msgr. Peters mentored the younger Father Travers who succeeded him as pastor of Sts. Peter and Paul. “I spent a lot of time with him. I just enjoyed his company. I could go to him with any question and he would sit down and talk things out.”
Even when the monsignor was hospitalized a month ago, “we talked all the time about the parish,” Father Travers said. “That was his life.”
“His life was the priesthood and he did well,” Father Travers said. “I am going to miss him terribly.”
“He was just a good person,” he said. “I’m not canonizing him; he was just a good person.”
Condolences may be sent to Msgr. Peter’s sisters: Marge Ellen Albouze, 5136 Teichert Avenue, Sacramento, CA 95819, and June T. Peters, 350 37th Street, Sacramento, CA 95816.