Father Albert Remigius Kozak

Father Albert Remigius Kozak

Aug. 12, 1927-Dec. 18, 2013

Hattiesburg, MS

Father Remigius Albert Kozak, 86, a retired priest of the Diocese of Biloxi, died on Dec. 18 at Bedford Care Center in Hattiesburg.

Visitation will take place on Dec. 23 from 5 to 8 pm at Hulett Winstead Funeral Home, 205 Bay St, Hattiesburg. Mass of Christian Burial will be celebrated on Dec. 24 at 9: 30 am with visitation 30 minutes prior at St. Thomas Aquinas Church, 3117 West Fourth Street, Hattiesburg. Burial will follow at Paulding Cemetery in Jasper County at 2:00 pm.

Father Kozak was born in Morrell, Pennsylvania on Aug. 12, 1927. He was the youngest of five children born to Czechoslovakian immigrants. Three other children died during infancy.

Father Kozak attended St. Vincent Arch Abbey, the Benedictine Monastery near Greensburg Pennsylvania. During his time at St. Vincent, young Albert was asked to choose a religious name. After foregoing traditional names like John and Michael, he settled on Remigius, who was the Bishop of Rheims in France.

Originally, he had planned to continue his studies at St. Vincent but later decided to join the Cistercians. After two years of study at the Generalate of the Cistercian Order in Rome, where he attended International Benedictine College of San Anselmo and Gregorian University, Father Kozak transferred to Canada where he continued his theological studies at the University Seminary of St. Paul in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada.

Father Kozak was ordained on May 29, 1954 at St. John Cathedral in Milwaukee and stayed at the Cistercian monastery in Wisconsin for a year-and-a-half before moving to the Cistercian Monastery in Rose Hill, Mississippi in 1956.

He was incardinated into the Diocese of Natchez-Jackson on Nov. 1, 1974. As a priest of the Diocese of Jackson, Father Kozak served as associate pastor, administrator and pastor of St. Michael Parish, Paulding and its missions - St. Anne, Newton and Good Shepherd, Quitman. He also served as pastor of St. Michael Parish, Paulding and St. Anne Parish, Carthage.

In 1990, Father Kozak was named administrator of St. Bernadette Parish, Waynesboro. He was incardinated into the Diocese of Biloxi on July 1, 1993 and retired from active ministry on Dec. 29, 1995. Father Kozak spent many happy days in retirement at his home in Rose Hill, which he called "The Hermitage," before poor moving into an assisted living facility due to poor health.

He was preceded in death by his parents and siblings, including his brother, Father Francis Kozak and John A. Kozak, Jr. three infant brothers and his sisters, Anna Wolfe and Mary Sutherland.

He is survived by two nieces Carol Cunningham, of Connellsville, Pennsylvania and Pam Moats, of Philippi, West Virginia; and two nephews: Francis Kozak, of Bowie, Maryland; Harry Pirl, of South Connellsville, Pennsylvania.