Dominican Fr. Francis-Hung Le reassigned

IC photo/Marie Mischel

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Dominican Fr. Francis-Hung Le preaches June 27 at St. Francis Xavier Catholic Church in Kearns.

SALT LAKE CITY — Dominican Fr. Francis-Hung Le, who has ministered in the Diocese of Salt Lake City for the past two years, has been reassigned by the Western Dominican Province to Seattle, Wash.

“I am grateful, grateful to the Lord for the last two years,” he said June 27 during his last Mass at St. Francis Xavier Parish, where he has served as parochial vicar and taught RCIA for the past year. He added that he especially will miss celebrating the weekly children’s Mass at the parish, “because they are so lively; I learn a lot.”

He has asked the Lord that he and the parishioners will meet again, he said, and also that God will help them to do their part to promote the culture of life, and to embrace the Cross. “In doing that, we will be gathered, gathered in Heaven,” he said.

Fr. Francis was born in Hue, Vietnam. He attended high school in Santa Barbara, Calif., then received a Bachelor of Science in electrical and computer engineering from University of California at Santa Barbara and a Master of Science from UC-Santa Clara. After entering the seminary, he earned a bachelor’s degree in philosophy and a Master of Divinity degree from the Dominican School of Philosophy & Theology. He became a U.S. citizen in 1987.

He was ordained a priest for the Western Dominican Province on May 29, 2004 by Bishop Allen H. Vigneron. For the province, he served various assignments in California, Alaska, Oregon, Washington and Utah. In 2019, he arrived in the Diocese of Salt Lake City to serve as superior of the local Dominican community at St. Catherine of Siena Newman Center in Salt Lake City. In addition, he was the chaplain for Judge Memorial Catholic High School during the 2019-20 academic year, then went to St. Francis Xavier Parish.

In Utah, “people are hungry … for basic knowledge of the faith, of the Bible, of the doctrine,” he said in an interview, adding that he enjoyed helping the bishop “feed the flock.”  

“I enjoy a lot preaching and teaching,” in addition to celebrating the liturgy, he said.

Because he is multilingual, on some weekends he celebrated Mass in three different languages: English and Spanish at St. Francis Xavier and the Latin Mass at St. Martin de Porres Parish. When necessary, he also filled in at Our Lady of Perpetual Help Parish, which has Mass in Vietnamese.

He does have one regret about his time in Utah; he was so busy during the past two years that “I didn’t really have time to explore the beauty of Utah,” he said, although as an avid skier he did hit the slopes during the winter.

At the June 27 Mass, George Jockisch, Grand Knight for the St. Francis Xavier Parish’s Knights of Columbus council, said he spent a lot of time with Fr. Francis during the past two years, and “it’s really hard to say goodbye to him. He’s been a good friend as well as obviously a good priest.”