A funeral Mass for Father James C. Carter, SJ, was celebrated May 30 in the chapel of St. Ignatius Hall, the Jesuit Community at Garden Villas North in Florissant.
Father Carter, president emeritus of Loyola University New Orleans and the school’s longest-tenured president, died May 22 in Florissant. He was 98 years old, a Jesuit for 80 years and a priest for 67 years.
James C. Carter was born in New York City on Aug. 1, 1927, to James C. and Elizabeth Dillon Carter. He entered the Society of Jesus in Grand Coteau, Louisiana, in 1945 and pronounced first vows on the feast of St. Ignatius Loyola on July 31, 1947. He was ordained a priest on June 22, 1958, at Woodstock College in Woodstock, Maryland, and professed final vows in the Society at the Gesú Church in Miami.
Father Carter earned a bachelor of science in physics from Spring Hill College in Mobile, Alabama, a master of science in physics from Fordham University in New York and a doctorate from The Catholic University of America in Washington, D.C. He completed a licentiate in sacred theology at Woodstock College.
In 1960, he was assigned to teach physics at Loyola University New Orleans. He would remain in service there for most of the next six decades. In 1970, he was named provost and academic vice president, and in 1974 he began a 21-year tenure as the school’s president.
During his years of ministry in New Orleans, Father Carter led by example in the service of faith and promotion of justice. He served as a division director of the United Way, a director at New Orleans Public Service Inc. and as president of the Metropolitan Area Committee. Father Carter served as interim executive director of the Association of Jesuit Colleges and Universities in 1996 and as co-chair of the New Orleans region of the board of the National Conference for Community and Justice. Among other honors, Loyola presented Father Carter with an honorary doctorate in 1995.
From 2001 to 2004, Father Carter served as pastor and superior of the Jesuit community at Immaculate Conception Parish in New Orleans before returning to Loyola in 2004 to serve as a pastoral minister and part-time science, religion and physics teacher.
He remained at Loyola University until mid-2020, when he was assigned to a ministry of prayer, first at the St. Alphonsus Rodriguez Pavilion in Grand Coteau and later at St. Ignatius Hall in Florissant.
He was predeceased by his parents and two brothers, Dr. John F. Carter and Dr. Anthony Carter. He is survived by his sister-in-law, Charlene Carter, and his brothers in the Society of Jesus.
Burial was in Calvary Cemetery.
