Click here to download a PDF of the funeral homily for Fr. Steve, given by Fr Tom Westhoven, SCJ.
Fr. Steve Wiese, SCJ, died on January 13. He was 83.
Originally from New Brunswick, NJ, he did his philosophy studies at the community’s Kilroe Seminary in Honesdale, PA, and theology at Sacred Heart Monastery (now Sacred Heart Seminary and School of Theology in Hales Corners, WI). He professed first vows in 1955 and was ordained in 1963.
Fr. Steve learned about the Priests of the Sacred Heart (Dehonians) through his parish pastor. In the 1950s at the age of 19, he was considered a “delayed” vocation. The SCJs had a program for candidates who needed to catch up to their counterparts who had been in the minor seminary. In one year he said that he “crammed in four years’ worth of Latin, Greek and theology.”
His first assignments were in education and vocations, serving as a teacher at Dehon Seminary in Great Barrington, MA, Trinity College in Redlands, CA, and Immaculate Heart of Mary Seminary in Lenox, MA.
Fr. Steve’s first parish assignment was at St. Mary’s Co-Cathedral in Natchez, MS from 1967-68. He then served five years at All Saints parish in Eagle Butte, SD and three years at St. Mathew’s parish in Corona, CA, before pursuing a call to the missions.
In 1976 he began a two-year assignment at St. Therese Mission in Lesotho (Africa). “That was like going in a time warp,” he said of the experience.
When he returned to the States he took a five-year assignment at Sacred Heart Seminary and School of Theology. He then returned to parish ministry, including six years at Sacred Hearts of Jesus and Mary parish in Franklin, WI (now, St. Martin of Tours).
Fr. Steve also served at St. Matthew’s in Houston and with the retirement community at Villa Maria (now the Sacred Heart Community at SHML in Franklin) before retiring in 2004.
A member of the Sacred Heart Community at SHML, he had been in assisted living and nursing care for the past several years.
All services will be at Good Shepherd Chapel at Sacred Heart at Monastery Lake in Franklin, WI, on Saturday, January 20. Reception of the body and wake service will start at 9:30 am. Mass of Christian Burial will begin at 10:30 am. Interment in Sacred Heart Mausoleum will follow (weather permitting).
