It is with great sadness that we announce the death of Canon Tom O’Connor in the early hours of Tuesday 24 March. He died peacefully at home at the Manor House in Otley.
Please pray for the repose of Canon Tom’s soul and for all his family and friends at this time.
Details of the funeral arrangements will be available here in due course.
Eternal rest grant unto him, O Lord, and let perpetual light shine upon him. May he rest in peace. Amen.
Very Rev Thomas Brendan O’Connor RIP
Canon Tom O’Connor was born in County Kerry, Ireland on 7 January 1936. He studied for the priesthood at All Hallows College in Dublin, where he was ordained on 14 June 1959.
Following his ordination Fr Tom travelled to Yorkshire to take up his first appointment in the Diocese of Leeds, at St Patrick’s Church, Huddersfield. In 1966 he moved to the Sacred Heart, Bingley and four years later he became an Assistant Priest at St Joseph’s, parish in Hunslet, Leeds.
In 1974 Fr Tom became a Parish Priest for the first time when Bishop Wheeler appointed him to the Sacred Heart, Hemsworth. From 1979 to 1989 he was Parish Priest of St Brigid’s, Huddersfield and from 1989 to 2000 he served the parish of St Mary’s, Batley. In 2000 he became parish Priest of Our Lady and All Saints, Otley from where he retired in 2012. While at Otley he was appointed to the Cathedral Chapter by Bishop Roche in 2006.
In retirement Canon Tom remained in Otley, taking up residence in one of the flats in the Manor House, adjacent to the Church of Our Lady and All Saints. It was here that he died peacefully in the early hours of Tuesday 24 March 2026, in his ninety-first year and in the sixty-seventh year of his priesthood.
Canon Tom was a much-loved priest whose long years of ministry epitomise the dedication and service that so many Irish-born clergy have given to the Diocese of Leeds, its Bishops and its lay faithful, over the past 150 years. He will be remembered with great affection and respect by all who knew him.
May he rest in peace.
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