Born on 2 January 1841 in Ballinafad, a village in the south of County Sligo in the west of Ireland, Healy was educated at Maynooth College, where he was ordained a priest in September 1867.He then served as a curate and parish priest in the Diocese of Elphin, before being offered two professorial chairs at Maynooth, those of Theology and Classics.He translated to the Archbishopric of Tuam on 13 February 1903, where he reestablished pilgrimage to Croagh Patrick.Joyce in 1931, titled John Healy, Archbishop of Tuam (H. Gill and Sons, Dublin 1931).Healy was a noted academic, and published a number of works on Irish and church history, with a particular emphasis on Early Christian Ireland.