Fr. Felix's selfless service

by Tom Gallagher

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September 20, 2010

From the Honolulu Star Advertiser:

While most of the Catholic world had its eyes on the Pope's trip to the U.K., in Hawaii, "A crowd of people poured out of the yellow Yamaguchi school bus and surged into the church like the tide. They rented the bus to take them from Waialua all the way to Kaimuki on a Thursday evening to attend the funeral of their beloved priest. Some people flew in for the funeral from Kauai, because he was their beloved priest for 24 years. For the last several years, he was Kalaupapa's humble, sturdy priest, too.

Father Felix Vandebroek had a way of being at home wherever he was. He made dear friends everywhere he lived."

"Wherever he was assigned he would adhere himself wholeheartedly to his parish family," said Father Christopher Keahi, provincial of the Sacred Hearts Fathers in Hawaii, the order to which Vandebroek belonged. "I have never heard a disparaging remark from anyone, but rather praise and earnest pleas to allow him to be with them throughout his priestly life."

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