Cardinal Seán P. O’Malley OFM Cap. has announced the appointment of Father Stephen M. Healy as pastor of Our Lady of the Lake Parish in Halifax. The appointment was effective on Feb. 1.

Father Healy was born in Boston and before graduating from Marlborough High School he attended local schools in Arlington and Acton, as well as Marlborough. An alumnus of both St. John’s Seminary College and the archdiocesan theology house, St. John’s Seminary, both in Brighton, Father Healy was ordained to the priesthood at Holy Cross Cathedral. His class was the first one ordained by Cardinal Bernard Law. The ordination on June 8, 1985 was just a few weeks following the cardinal’s reception of his red hat in late May 1985 ceremonies.

Prior to his ordination he served his deacon internship at Sacred Heart Parish, Roslindale. He also celebrated his first Mass at the Roslindale parish.

Following ordination he was named a parochial vicar at St. Brigid Parish in suburban Lexington. Massachusetts Avenue would become even more familiar territory when Father Healy moved east to neighboring St. James the Apostle Parish, Arlington in 1990.

In 1994, he moved south to what would be his longest assignment, again as a parochial vicar, now at St. Ann by the Sea Parish in Marshfield. In 2002 he was named parochial vicar at St. Edward Parish in Brockton and in 2005 to a similar post at St. Francis of Assisi Parish in Braintree.

Continuing his parish service he was named parochial vicar at St. Bridget Parish in Abington, serving with Father Jim Mahoney. When the pastor of Halifax was transferred in November 2007, Father Healy was named a member of the Emergency Response Team and served as interim administrator of the lakeside parish.

The reception that he received at Halifax during the weeks before and after Christmas signaled that he might be a good man for the job. Father Healy’s experience in various parishes in widely different parts of the archdiocese, as well as having benefited from working with a number of pastors give him a breadth of experiences from which he can draw in Halifax.