Blessed Francis Xavier Seelos Mass

Join us for Mass at Sacred Heart Parish in Seattle to celebrate Blessed Francis Xavier Seelos on his feast day.  There will be a Mass at 12 pm and 7 pm.  Father Harry Grile, C.Ss.R., the former Director of the Seelos Center in New Orleans, will preside and preach at both Masses. After both Masses the Redemptorists will offer the Sacrament of the Sick.

Born in Bavaria in 1819, Blessed Francis Xavier Seelos joined the Redemptorists and did missionary work in the United States from 1843 to 1867.  He preached missions in German and English throughout the Northeast and Midwest.  He was particularly devoted to the confessional and was revered as an exceptional confessor and spiritual director. After a year as assistant pastor of St. Mary’s in Detroit in 1866, he was assigned as pastor of Assumption Parish in New Orleans. There he made a great effort to care for the poor, sick, and neglected. While caring for victims of yellow fever, he contracted the disease himself. Only a year after being assigned, he died in New Orleans on October 4, 1867. He was beatified in 2000.

Fr. Harry Grile, C.Ss.R. is one of the Redemptorists who has done it all.  He has been a parish priest, pastor,  Parish Mission Preacher, Director of Liguori Publications and Provincial. He was the Director of the National Shrine of Blessed Francis Xavier Seelos until he was transferred to the Redemptorist community in Seattle.