Fr. Paul Grauls, SDB (1935-2019)

Fr. Paul Grauls, SDB (1935-2019)

Fr. Paul Grauls, SDB, died on Saturday morning, November 30, in hospice care at Suncoast Care Center in Palm Harbor, Fla. He was 84 years old and had been a professed Salesian of Don Bosco for 66 years and a priest 8 days short of 57 years.

Fr. Grauls was hospitalized at St. Anthony’s Hospital in St. Petersburg for pneumonia for a few days before transfer to hospice. He received Anointing of the Sick from Fr. Jay Horan, SDB, the night before he died.

Fr. Grauls was born in Etterbeek, a suburb of Brussels, Belgium, on June 27, 1935, the son of Peter and Augusta Van De Schoor Grauls. He was baptized the following day in the parish church.

Paul entered the Salesian seminary at Woluwe, Belgium, in 1947, and was admitted to the novitiate at Groot-Bijgaarden in August 1953. He made his first profession of vows on September 2, 1954, at Groot-Bijgaarden. He immigrated to the U.S. in 1957 to complete his philosophy studies at Don Bosco College Seminary in Newton, N.J., graduating in 1958 with a B.A. He later earned a B.Ed. at St. Joseph University in Moncton, N.B. (1965), an M.A. in history from Seton Hall University in South Orange, N.J. (1968), an M.A. in guidance from New York University in New York City (1969), and a Ph.D. in education from SUNY Albany (1975).

His Master’s thesis at Seton Hall was entitled The Human Psychology of Charles Fourier: A Phenomenological Approach.

Fr. Paul studied theology at the Salesians’ St. Thomas Aquinas studentate in Oud-Heverlee, Belgium, affiliated with the University of Louvain (1956-1957, 1960-1963), and was ordained at Oud-Heverlee on December 8, 1962.

Fr. Paul (right) with his brother Fr. Fernand, ca. 1962

(photo supplied by Fr. Paul in 2012)

Fr. Paul taught at St. Patrick’s High School in Sherbrooke, Que. (1958-1960), and was prefect of studies there (1963-1965). One of his students, Fr. George Harkins, a Salesian now serving at Seminaire Salésien in Sherbrooke, recalls: “Fr. Paul Grauls taught me Latin in grade 11 at St. Patrick High School … in 1958-59. He was an excellent pedagogue, polite in manner and a big heart for young people. He always made me feel welcome and encouraged me to try the Salesian way of life. I joined and have never looked back. May he rest in peace.”

Fr. Paul was then assigned to Don Bosco Technical High School in Paterson, N.J. (1965-1975), as teacher and guidance counselor. At the same time he did much of the aforementioned academic work. For four years as consultant to the province director of education, he undertook a major study of the New Rochelle Province’s works and its personnel in their demographic contexts (1975-1979), residing for a year at Don Bosco Seminary and three years at the Marian Shrine in Haverstraw, N.Y.

Fr. Paul (right) and Fr. John Cosgrove at Nativity Church in Washington

(courtesy of Nativity Church)

Fr. Paul was assistant pastor at St. Thomas the Apostle Church in Harlem, N.Y., from 1979 to 2003, and for another year at St. Joseph’s Church in Harlem. From 2004 until 2014 he was assistant pastor at the Church of the Nativity in Washington, D.C., where he is most fondly remembered by numerous parishioners. He was also vice director of the Salesian community of Washington (2005-2014).

Fr. Paul venerates the relic of St. John Bosco 

at the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception in Washington in 2010.

Fr. Paul after celebrating a class Mass for students of Cristo Rey Tampa HS in 2016

(photo by Fr. Dennis Donovan)

Fr. Paul retired in 2014 to St. Philip the Apostle Residence in Tampa, where he did what he could to maintain contact with the students of Cristo Rey Tampa High School on campus. In his latter years in Washington and continuing in Tampa he labored to produce an English version of a graphic-arts (comics) life of St. John Bosco, Don Bosco, Friend of the Young, by his fellow Belgian Jijé (Joseph Gillain), finally completing the project in 2018. Shortly after, his health began to decline and he was admitted to Bon Secours Maria Manor in St. Petersburg for nursing care.

Fr. Paul’s funeral rites were celebrated in both Tampa (Dec. 3-4) and Haverstraw (Dec. 6). Fr. Tim Zak, provincial, presided in Tampa and Fr. Steve Ryan, former director in Tampa, in Haverstraw. He was buried in the Salesian Cemetery in Goshen, N.Y., on Saturday, Dec. 7.

Fr. Ryan posted a magnificent tribute to Fr. Paul in his weekly reflections:
https://mail.google.com/mail/u/0/#inbox/WhctKJVjPfBFSJSnSvlmqWtwcxtNBhlmJgKMtbpmPVQcfgMCtVWdbFXcpQdWHvRzNLSjbgQ