Fr. Stephen Vileo said the Redemptorists taught him much about Mary’s powerful intercession. He said they have a devotion to the icon Our Lady of Perpetual Help because, in 1866, Pope Pius IX gave the icon to the Redemptorists to keep with the words “Make Her Known.”Monroe — Fr. Stephen Vileo stands at the altar of the historic church where he has been pastor for the last seven years in Monroe, and ponders his 28 years as a diocesan priest in the Archdiocese of Detroit. The church is St. Michael the Archangel, founded in 1852 by the Congregation of the Most Holy Redeemer, more commonly known as the Redemptorists.
“I celebrated Mass under the gaze of St. Alphonsus (Ligouri) for years and didn’t even know it,” said Fr. Vileo, indicating the icon on the ceiling to the right. St. Alphonsus is the founder of the Redemptorists, the order Fr. Vileo will soon be joining to discern becoming a permanent member.
Ordained as a priest in 1987 under Cardinal Edmund C. Szoka, he said he had been considering joining a religious order since he was in the seminary in Rome.
He remembers one of his fellow seminarians, Fr. Bob Conroy, who choose to become a priest for the Missionaries of Charity.
“He was studying at the seminary for the Archdiocese of Kansas City, Kan.,” said Fr. Vileo. “And he struggled telling them about his decision.”
This diocesan tie is one of the reasons Fr. Vileo did not choose to pursue a religious order vocation when he was ordained: “I thought how Cardinal Szoka had been very good to me. It would be like backing out of something. So I didn’t consider it.”
The cardinal had Fr. Vileo sent to Rome for theology studies, and when he returned for a brief vacation in 1985, Cardinal Szoka asked him to concentrate his studies to moral theology. Back in Rome, he was then under the tutelage of the Redemptorists at the Academy of St. Alphonsus Ligouri.
“They definitely had an influence on my life,” he said. His own spiritual director, Fr. John Phelps, is a Redemptorist. In Rome, his teachers offered him a job teaching moral theology there.
“But Cardinal (Adam) Maida (then archbishop of Detroit) wanted me to come home,” he said.
He remembers how the present archbishop, Allen Vigneron, took the news about his decision.
“He was quiet for a time,” Fr. Vileo said. “But overall he was very supportive. His first comment was that we have to pray about this some more.”
The parishioners and staff at St. Michael had a different reaction.
“When I told them, at first they were upset,” Fr. Vileo said. “I revealed it in stages, and at every stage, their first reaction was ‘You’re not leaving!’” When he explained why he was leaving, he said, “They understood … they were happy for me.”
Pastoral associate Susan Lyke, who has worked with Fr. Vileo during his entire stint at St. Michael, said, “We are definitely going to miss him. He is a wonderful pastor — kind and caring. He gives inspiring homilies. What I like best is that, always toward the end of whatever his message is, he brings it back to the altar and receiving the Eucharist. That’s what it’s all about.”
The heart of a teacher
As the River Raisin nearly overflows its banks next to the St. Michael’s parking lot, Fr. Vileo remembers how it only flooded once during his time there.
“There are days when you could walk across it without getting your feet wet,” he said. “But not after this spring.”
He remembers that, when the parking lot floods, so does the basement of the school next door. And this thought brings him to discuss his “nagging” desire to be a teacher. He recalls his first attempt at Our Lady of the Lakes in Waterford, his first diocesan assignment in 1988-89. The 11th grade Church history instructor was on maternity leave, so he was asked to step in.
Fr. Stephen Vileo stands behind the altar of St. Michael the Archangel Parish in Monroe, where he has been pastor for seven years. After 28 years as a diocesan priest, Fr. Vileo is discerning life with the Redemptorist religious order.“I was a disaster at it at first,” he said. “I didn’t know how to control the class. I thought they would be in awe of a priest. I tried to teach Church history like the Jesuits had taught me in Rome.”
He would eventually learn to leverage his natural, low-key personality and just “be” with the kids. Things started turning around when he was serving as supervisor during lunch hour at the school. A group of students were struggling to solve a chemistry equation, and he offered to help. (Before he was called to the priesthood, Fr. Vileo considered medical school and studied chemistry at Wayne State University in Detroit.)
“After I showed them how to solve the problem, they asked me a couple of times ‘You mean you went to college?’” he said with a smile.
In 1993, while at St. Alphonsus in Dearborn, Fr. Vileo became connected with the young adult ministry and later served as chaplain at Brother Rice and Marian high schools.
“When you work with young people, it’s a rush,” he said. “When you look in their eyes, there is a moment when they finally get it. They get a gleam when they realize they are going to be faithful the rest of their lives.”
“These kids are ripe to hear the Gospel. Jesus is the answer for what ails these kids.”
Discovering his ‘inner missionary’
Fr. Vileo doesn’t know if he will work with young people as a Redemptorist, though he believes the order’s work is steering more toward adolescents because there is a need in the Church as a whole.
The Redemptorists’ vocations webpage boldly proclaims: “Discover your inner missionary.” Becoming a missionary is the only way Fr. Vileo said he can find to answer his need to give away “everything he has” to God.
“God made us like that,” he said. “I was raised to believe that my gifts and talents should be used for others. I’m 56 years old, I have lots of energy, good health, and I still have an idealized view of the world.”
Preaching to Mother Teresa
One of Fr. Vileo’s heroes is Blessed Teresa of Calcutta, whom he would meet four times during her life. In the summer of 1984, he spent six weeks with the Missionaries of Charity at their Home for the Dying in Calcutta.
“We (the seminarians) all had apostolate experiences during our formation. Mine always was with the Missionaries of Charity,” Fr. Vileo said.
After Fr. Vileo was just ordained, he remembers he had to preach a sermon to the Missionaries of Charity at their house in Rome. He was surprised to see Mother Teresa, who often visited Rome, kneeling in the corner.
“I’m barely ordained,” he recalled thinking. “I thought, ‘What am I going to say to this nun about feeding the 5,000?’” (That was the Gospel of the day.)
Fr. Vileo said he talked about the Jesus’ humility convincing His Father in Heaven to consent to the miracle. He then told the nuns about how his own mother had told him he was not going to get out of yard work just because he was a priest.
“The missionaries thought that was hilarious,” he said.
Surprisingly, when he began looking at religious orders, he didn't feel called to the Missionaries of Charity. Before he decided on the Redemptorists, he would consider the Jesuits, who turned him down because he was too old (33 at the time). He considered the Dominicans, who have a beautiful spirituality, but he said, “I’m not a monk.”
