June 2, 2014
Father Robert William Baer, CSP, was born in Jackson Heights, N.T., on December 12, 1945. He entered the novitiate of the Paulist Fathers on Aug. 24, 1947, and was ordained on May 1, 1954.
Father Baer’s first priestly assignment was as associate pastor at the Church of the Good Shepherd in New York City from 1954-56. He then served as the Paulist vocation director for the Midwest based at Old St. Mary’s Church in Chicago from 1965-59.
Father Baer entered campus ministry, serving at Tufts and Brandeis universities out of St. Ann’s Parish in Boston from 1959-65. He continued in campus ministry at the University of California at Berkeley from 1965-67 before entering pastoral studies in theology at the University of Nijmegen in Nijmegen, Holland from 1967-70.
Father Baer returned to Boston in 1970 and founded People of Promise, which he led until 1978. In 1978, Father Baer began studies at the CG Jung Institut in Zurich, Switzerland until 1982, when he returned to Boston to minister as a Jungian analyst.
Now in senior ministry, Father Baer resides at the Paulist residence in Boston.