Father Joseph H. Maier, C.Ss.R., born Oct. 31, 1939, is an American Redemptorist priest who lives and works in the Klong Toey slums of Bangkok. For over 45 years, he has helped strengthen Bangkok’s poorest families and communities while providing vulnerable children alternatives to and havens from violence, sex abuse, child trafficking, and prostitution in squatter slums.

As a missionary priest, Fr. Maier’s original Religious Obedience, in 1967, was to Bangkok to study official Bangkok-spoken Thai; then as Parish Priest to a remote Lao-speaking Catholic village in the rural North East of Thailand; then to a Catholic Hill Tribe Village in Northern Laos, where he ministered to first generation Catholic communities.

The raging civil war in Laos forced Fr. Joe back to Bangkok in 1972 to serve a 25-year tenure as the Parish Priest to the Catholic community in the Slaughter House neighborhood.

Fr. Joe joined with Sr. Maria Chantavarodom in 1972 to start the Human Development Foundation-Mercy Centre for his poor neighbors of all religions.

Father Joe Maier holds advanced degrees in Theological Studies and Urban Planning as well as an honorary doctorate in Social Administration from Thammasart University here in Thailand, and Acadia University in Canada. He has received numerous awards for outstanding citizenship, including a lifetime achievement award presented by Her Majesty the Queen of Thailand.