Born Joseph Lambert in Paterson, New Jersey on February 3, 1900, he graduated from Paterson Central High School and then was employed as a letter carrier. He applied to the Passionists in Holy Cross Province and was accepted. He entered the novitiate and professed his vows on October 25, 1925. He was ordained in Chicago, Illinois on December 20, 1931. Although he was ordained in Holy Cross Province, he spent his entire years of ministry with the eastern province of St. Paul of the Cross.
In 1931 he volunteered and was accepted for the China mission. He arrived in China in the summer of 1933 in the company of Provincial Benjamin Wirtz, C.P. of St. Paul of the Cross Province who was on canonical visitation of the Hunan mission. Father Lambert served in the China mission for eight years and in 1941 returned to the United States. During World War II he was stationed at Immaculate Conception Monastery, Jamaica, New York on local assignment. In 1945 he returned to China but had to evacuate, due to the Communist takeover, in 1949.
Upon his return to the United States he was assigned to St. Michael’s, Union City, New Jersey. On December 1, 1951 he set out for a Sunday call at Sacred Heart Parish, Lyndhusrt, New Jersey but he collapsed while walking from the train to the parish. One of his favorite hobbies was as a cartoonist.