Father Joseph Massucci never expected when he was ordained as a priest 51 years ago that he would spend his entire career as an educator.

“When I was finished with seminary and all the lectures and textbooks in Latin and English, I thought I would be a parish priest and do some teaching. I got to do both, but to my surprise, I became more of a teacher and school and college administrator. It’s not the path I originally envisioned but something I was assigned to do, and I’ve done it with the grace of God,” he said.

Father Massucci, 78, a Columbus native and a member of Columbus Bishop Hartley High School’s first graduating class, has been associated with the University of Dayton (UD) since 1985 as first a graduate student, and then a faculty member. He was chairman of the university’s Department of Educational Administration for 13 years before retiring from full-time teaching in 2014 and now holds the rank of professor emeritus.

He has never been officially assigned to a parish during his 36 years in Dayton but has been a pastoral presence for UD staff members and parishioners of several Dayton-area churches where he has been a weekend associate.

“I’ve taken care of a number of UD faculty members as they were dying,” he said. “They were concerned about death and felt comfortable when I tried to reassure them that their faith was the key to unlocking the door to what happens after death. That became a really awesome experience.

“At the various parishes I’ve served, I’ve helped people through marriages, funerals and other major events, and it’s been very sustaining and rewarding. I assisted at one parish, St. Rita’s in north Dayton, for 19 years, and the provost at UD told me that many people there thought of me as their pastor because I was there longer than the priests assigned to the parish.” 

Father Massucci also assisted at Miamisburg Our Lady of Good Hope Church for nine years and currently serves Centerville St. Francis, Beavercreek St. Luke and Kettering Assumption parishes and anywhere else he’s needed. “I was trained in such a way that it’s hard to say ‘no’ to people, and it’s much easier to say ‘yes,’” he said.

Father Massucci is the only son of the late Vincent James and Martha Ann (Cosentino) Massucci and has two younger sisters, one of them deceased. His father, who had opened an Italian restaurant in partnership with Romeo Sirij in Grandview Heights in 1949, decided he wanted to concentrate on pizza for carry-out only and opened the first of what are now 14 Massey’s Pizza locations in the early 1950s on East Livingston Avenue in Columbus. Vincent Massucci and his brother Dan followed with a second location on East Main Street in Whitehall.

“I was part of the business from the beginning, when I was in grade school,” Father Massucci said. “I started by bussing tables for waitresses. Back then, a quarter was a great tip,” he said. “It wasn’t long before I was making pizza, taking money, cutting pizza, monitoring the oven, slicing pepperoni and mozzarella – you name it. 

“When I was a freshman at Hartley, Dad’s mother died in Chicago, so he went to the funeral. I had to stay home from school because Dad put me in charge of making the dough for the two restaurants and of running the Livingston Avenue location, while Uncle Dan ran the Main Street one. That was quite a responsibility for a 14-year-old.”

When Bishop Hartley High opened in 1957, members of Father Massucci’s freshman class, which graduated in 1961, were the only students in the school, with one class added in each of the next three years. “We were very protective of that building, making sure the students coming after us were respectful of the property,” he said. 

“I remember how we’d pick up rocks from the ground in front of the school so eventually grass could be planted for a lawn. We had a real sense of being custodians of the site.”

Father Massucci said his class had a 60th anniversary reunion attended by about 30 people this fall. “I was the only priest in the class, the first Hartley graduate to be ordained. At the reunion, I didn’t need a name tag, since it was easy for my classmates to recognize me because of my Roman collar,” he said. Father Massucci said the class had about 140 members who graduated in 1961, at least 40 of whom are deceased.

“I think I always had the desire to be a priest,” he said. “My youngest sister, if she were alive, would tell you, ‘Joey always was a priest.’ The family were parishioners at St. Joseph Cathedral when I was young, and I can remember being mesmerized by what the priest was doing, even though, in those days, he stood facing the altar and we couldn’t see everything that was taking place. I’ve always been in love with the Mass and still feel that way today.”

He attended the cathedral’s former grade school, which closed after he was in first grade, and then went to Columbus Holy Cross, St. Catharine and Corpus Christi schools before coming to Hartley. 

Following graduation there, he attended the former Columbus St. Charles Seminary for two years as a day student, and then completed his priestly formation at the former St. John Vianney Seminary at Bloomingdale in the Diocese of Steubenville. That location is now a retreat and recreation center for Catholic families. 

He also earned a Master of Arts degree from the Catholic University of America in 1977, an Educational Specialist degree from UD in 1988 and a doctorate from the same institution in 1993.

He was ordained by Steubenville Bishop John King Mussio on May 16, 1970 and celebrated his first Mass at Columbus Corpus Christi Church the following day. 

“That was the one and only day I ever felt like royalty,” he said. “You come into the church at the end of a huge procession with servers, your parents and other priests, and the organ plays the music normally reserved for the entrance of a bishop. That’s the only time it’s played for you, unless you become a bishop. 

“I was presented a chalice representing Jesus’ crowning with thorns and at the time didn’t realize the symbolism of it. There have been plenty of thorns in my life, but God has helped me handle them, and they’ve been outnumbered by the happy moments.”

Father Massucci spent 15 years in the Steubenville diocese, serving as a teacher, and then assistant principal and principal at the former Guernsey Catholic Central High School in Cambridge, followed by 10 years as principal at Steubenville Catholic Central High School. 

“I find it fascinating that the high school where I was principal in Steubenville was founded by Bishop James Hartley, the namesake of the high school from which I graduated,” he said. Bishop Hartley, who served as bishop of Columbus from 1904-44, came to the city after serving as a pastor in Steubenville, which until 1944 was part of the Diocese of Columbus.

Father Massucci served at several parishes in the Steubenville diocese, most notably as pastoral administrator for five years at St. Mary Church in the Belmont County community of Temperanceville, one of the smallest Catholic churches in Ohio, which now is served by the pastor of Assumption Church in Barnesville.  “It’s a rural parish, and I’m a city boy, so the people there made it their goal to expose me to farm life. That was a memorable experience,” he said. 

“I enjoyed Guernsey Catholic, which had about 135 students and 14 faculty members, and felt a little reluctant about going to Catholic Central, which had about 900 students and 75 staff members. But Bishop Mussio told me, ‘The needs of the diocese far exceed the needs of any one individual,’ so I went to Steubenville,” Father Massucci said. “It took awhile to adjust, but things worked out.”

He said Bishop Mussio had a great impact on his priestly life, particularly after the bishop’s retirement in 1977, following 32 years as the diocese’s first bishop. “He did more to influence me by his actions as a retired bishop than at any other time,” he said. “He asked me if he could teach a class at the high school, and that surprised me, since he was the former bishop and I felt he didn’t have the need to ask. 

“I thought he would want to teach religion, but he asked to be an English teacher. That’s what he taught at Xavier University before he began studying for the priesthood. He educated and ordained me, yet as a retired bishop, he was receptive to the authority of a younger priest. That taught me a great lesson,” Father Massucci said. Bishop Mussio died in 1978, seven months after his retirement.

“Another great influence was the late Msgr. Paul Richter, who was pastor of (now-closed) Steubenville St. Anthony Church while I was a deacon intern for six months. He was given a temporary assignment there and stayed for 50 years. He was a wonderful inspiration, and the people loved him. It was really something to be a deacon at his parish,” Father Massucci said.

Asked to define what he feels is a priest’s most important responsibility, Father Massucci said, “The priest is the facilitator of Christ for the people – first and foremost through Christ’s presence in the Eucharist at every Mass. A priest is the servant of the people, the one who leads them prayerfully. I became a priest because I’ve loved the Mass since I was a boy, but I’m just Christ’s messenger.”