Someone You Should Know – Fr. Bill

By Alice Huth-Derrah

Ordained on June 9, 1973, in Duluth, Minnesota, and officially retired since 2012, Father William “Bill” Fournier celebrated 50 years in the priesthood in 2023. The St. Elizabeth Seton community is blessed to have Fr. Bill serving our parish. He brings a warm approachability, sense of humor, and a “common man’s sensibility” to his Sunday homilies. Displaying some of his distinctive wit, Father smiles and proffers a personal saying “I preach what I need to hear and anybody else is welcome to listen.”

Father Bill was born and raised on the south side of Chicago, an area of the city located south of the Chicago River and made up of many diverse neighborhoods. The younger of two sons, Father Bill says he “never remembers wanting to be anything other than a priest.” Although he enjoyed participating in sports, especially softball with other local kids, he entertained himself with a different kind of make-believe game. While other children were pretending to be firefighters or astronauts, Father laughingly says, “I was playing a priest celebrating Mass.” Fr. Bill’s parents were actively involved in their parish of St. Joseph and St. Anne, his father as an usher and his mother as the church secretary. Father says of his mom “she had a simple faith” and not much formal education. It wasn’t until later in his life that he realized and came to appreciate that “she had an unbreakable faith.”

Father Bill left home at the age of 13 to attend seminary school in Belleville, Illinois, joining the Oblates of Mary Immaculate. After completing high school, he earned a bachelor’s degree in psychology from Creighton University in Omaha, Nebraska, and from there headed to Rome to attend the Pontifical Gregorian University where he received a master’s degree in theology. Since the classes were taught in Italian, and Latin was part of the required coursework, Fr. Bill learned both languages concurrently. (He also holds a Masters in Adult Education.)

After returning to the United States in 1972, Father Bill was assigned to St. Jean’s Parish in Duluth, Minnesota, where he ministered for a number of years in various capacities, including teaching. In 1992 Father felt the call to serve as a parish pastor, and his first assignment was as Chaplain for the Newman Center at the University of Minnesota. Over time, he would go on to head up four different parishes. Possessing a “terminal case of wanderlust,” Father Bill also volunteered to serve in Wasilla, Alaska which is 40 miles north of Anchorage, and six months prior to his retirement, he served in Dutch Harbor, a remote town located in the Aleutian Islands of Alaska. He has traveled extensively, including many countries in Western Europe, the Middle East, Asia, South America, and Africa, yet he describes Italy as still being “my first love.”

When asked about his seemingly natural knack to being able to connect with people during his sermons, Father Bill says he was “blessed with being a good speaker” and “always won all of the speech contests in [the] seminary.” He describes his goal in delivering homilies as striving to be “motivational and…trying to make the gospel come alive.” With a grin he adds that the humorous aspects are a “gift from my dad.” Father says celebrating the Eucharist is the best part of being a priest as Jesus is “working through me…and it’s humbling.” To Father Bill “The Eucharist is food for the journey…we are a pilgrim people making our way to Christ. The Lord gives us the tangible food.” How fortunate it is for St. Elizabeth Seton’s pilgrims to have an accomplished shepherd and fellow sojourner like Father Bill leading us on our most important journey.

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