Father Robert L. Pinkston, CSP, dies

May 15, 2014

A Mass of the Resurrection for Father Robert Lee Pinkston, CSP, will be held May 17 at 11 a.m. at the Church of St. Paul the Apostle in New York City. Interment will follow the Mass in the Paulist section of St. Thomas the Apostle Cemetery in Oak Ridge, N.J. A luncheon will then be served in the St. Thomas social hall. Father Pinkston died May 9 in New York City. He was 73 at the time of his death and a member of the Missionary Society of St. Paul the Apostle for more than 50 years.

Father Pinkston was born in Temple, Texas, on Sept. 24, 1940. He made his first promise with the Paulist Fathers on Sept. 8, 1963, and was ordained a priest on Feb. 22, 1969 at the Church of St. Paul the Apostle in New York City.

Make a gift in memory of Fr. Pinkston After his ordination, Father Pinkston served as associate pastor at Good Shepherd Church in New York City from 1969-74. He then served as procurator of Old St. Mary’s Cathedral in San Francisco from 1974-78 before heading to the Catholic Information Center in Grand Rapids, Mich., where he served from 1978-81. From 1981-84, Father Pinkston served as procurator at the Church of St. Paul the Apostle in New York City before entering campus ministry at pastor of St. John’s University Parish at West Virginia University in Morgantown from 1984-92. He then returned to the Catholic Information Center in Grand Rapids, serving as director from 1992-99.

Father Pinkston took a sabbatical at the Paulist Center in Boston from 1999-2000 before serving as pastor at Old St. Mary’s Cathedral in San Francisco and entering senior ministry that same year.