Understanding Fr. Stephan
I have heard from a relatively large number of people about their difficulty in understanding Fr. Stephan at Mass. I have been responding individually, but I think the time has come for me to discuss it in the Pastor’s Note.
First, I understand and empathize. He and I live together, and even one-on-one there are times that I need him to repeat a word multiple times for me to understand. I assure you it is frustrating for both of us. If you struggle, you are not alone.
Second, we are taking concrete steps to ease communication. With the help of the Archdiocese, we have enrolled him in a Pronunciation class at Whatcom Community College. We are also working on finding individual tutors, both through the Whatcom Literacy Council (consider volunteering with them!) and certain parishioners with relevant expertise. I have also spoken with him about preaching shorter homilies while people get used to him manner of speaking.
Third, I have to draw a line in the sand about accepting the priests who are assigned to us. When the Archdiocese assigned Fr. Tyler as full-time chaplain to WWU (a decision I support), we already went from four priests in Whatcom County to three (at least for the pastoral needs of our parishioners). We cannot reduce our priests further to two, just because we are allowing communication difficulties to obscure Fr. Stephan’s identity and role as a priest of Jesus Christ. We must rely on him fully for confessions, for funerals, for anointings, and for pastoral care. The alternative is to ask Fr. Thumbi and myself to carry double our previous workload, which will quickly burn us out, destroy our mental health, and result in zero priests. I can tell you, communication struggles aside, I have found Fr. Stephan to be joyful, humorous, prayerful, and loyal to the Church, and I have high hopes for his future in our county.
Finally, a more spiritual reflection. Sad to say, with all of our wealth and resources, the United States has become a missionary country, in need of the help of foreign priests just to stay afloat. The older generations will remember a time when the U.S. was sending hundreds of missionary priests to the “pagan babies” in Africa and Asia; now our country has fallen so far away from faith that those pagan babies, returned as priests, are the only reason we are still (barely) functioning as a national church. Fr. Stephan is one of those missionary priests, who did not have to leave his home and family, but chose to out of love and compassion for those without easy access to the sacraments. Communication difficulties are only the very beginning of our problems as a missionary land – the next step, without these foreign missionaries, will be church closures and Masses less than weekly. It is, ultimately, our own fault that we have not produced enough priests to serve our own population, so we have to foster a sense of thanksgiving that anyone is willing to leave a faith-filled country to serve in our secularized desert.
None of this is to say that these transitions are easy. You are not wrong for struggling with any of this Partners business. And I want to hear from you about your struggles and difficulties – it helps me pray for you and to fix what I can. But the incredible thing about Christianity is that the Lord uses even (and sometimes especially) our struggles for our sanctification. Things will not be returning to “normal”, and we all have to do the hard work of adjusting to new realities, but I am hopeful nevertheless, because this remains Jesus’ Church, under the guidance of his Holy Spirit, and the Lord will use all of this for our salvation and the salvation of the world!
(The printed version also contained a bio of Fr. Thumbi, taken from: https://www.stmp.org/pastors-of-st-thomas-more)
Fr. Moore 
This was very well done. Kudos.
Chris
Thank you for hanging in there with us all. As long as those in authority insist on keeping things “normal” we can only burn out those priests who are still with us. We had a church led by it’s members, a woman coordinator who helped in every avenue of our daily lives, a pastor who didn’t burn out. Who was there for our celebrations, our liturgies and received the support and love of us all. We were all inclusive with a huge Hispanic community and combined celebrations and music. We have the oldest Food Bank in the city. Our St. Vincent de Paul is still alive and working for good. Unfortunately, we sit on very valuable property. Our church doors are closed. We have appealed to Rome. In our fourth year, we meet weekly on Zoom. While we were still in the building, we too had a priest who had an accent undecipherable to those in the church. We solved it by projecting the homily onto the wall as Father said his words. We continue to use our members as lectors, homilists, musicians, community activities. We call ourselves the “Spirit of St. Mary’s”. Once in awhile we are allowed to use the church building for a funeral of a long time parishoner. We still have hope.
Thank you, Judy.
I think you, Pat, and I might see things, including the St. Mary’s situation, a little differently. But I appreciate you perspective nonetheless.
“Understanding Father Stephan” is a beautifully deft “Pastor’s Note” title for we parishioners. In persona Christi, the Latin phrase for “in the person of Christ,” is how Father Stephan Arockia Dass ministers to all of us.
Also beautifully, his parents named him. Stephan, the first Christian martyr, means “name” or “wreath.” Arockia, his middle name, deeply rooted in South Indian and Christian culture, connotes divine favor and protection, spiritual understanding and compassion.
God bless Father Dass, his holy parents and his priesthood. Blest are we!
Thank you Fr. Moore for sharing with us the difficulties understanding Fr. Stephan. I found that if I watched his mouth, I could better understand him. I also found it was harder to understand when he raised his voice to emphasize a point. I met him when he first came to St. Anne’s and I can only imagine the adjustments he must be making for us. Could he post his homilies in the weekly notes? I did enjoy his homilies…
Anne
Thank you, Anne.
Fr. Stephan does not pre-write his homilies, so text-based solutions are unfortunately not available.