August 13, 2024

Recollections of Fr. Frank Sofie

from Sister Mary Michael, SsEW

While the summer has been busy enough to keep us from posting regularly, we didn’t want to pass over this reflection by Sister Mary Michael, after the death of Fr. Frank Sofie, a great friend of our community.

November 2022 at St. Dominic in Mobile

Fr. Frank Sofie was ordained on the 10th anniversary of my own baptismal date, June 10. He was assigned to our parish and school, and one of the first things I remember he did was take a group of us fifth graders all around the church showing us the parts of the Mass, the vessels, what took place and when during the liturgy, and even quizzed us on the names of everything. We did pretty well as a group, until we stumbled over “the name for the chair that the priest sits in” during the readings. Father’s answer: “The priest’s chair.” He was pretty happy with that trick question, and decades later, I still smile whenever I see “the priest’s chair” in any church.

I’ve never forgotten what it was like to be taken around the church. Father Sofie loved the Mass and the Sacraments, and it instilled in me a love for liturgical practice and the sense of mystery surrounding what we do as Catholics. The sense of the mystery has never left me. As a middle-schooler, I wanted to become a sacristan when I grew up. I think religious Sister fulfilled that dream well, and much more so.

Father Sofie was a great friend of our foundress, Mother Mary Gabriel, and years later, it was a blessing to see him at Casa Maria. He gave retreats, attended Lay Dominican retreats, and even preached for us on Zoom during COVID, so that we could email our retreatants conferences filled with hope and the love of God. When Father Sofie shared with me that he had written a book on the Mass, Praying the Mass from the Pew, I immediately mentioned Casa Maria Publishing as a possibility to publish his book. It was a great privilege to participate in this project, and is a blessing to see it bear fruit and to see him continue to give others what he gave us fifth graders so many years ago.

When Father’s cancer returned for the last time, he made the arrangements for his funeral – including asking us Sister Servants to sing his funeral Mass. At the end of June, we traveled to Mobile to fulfill that request, not just as a thank you for so many gifts he’s given the Archdiocese of Mobile and the universal Church. We sang his Mass not just to say goodbye, but perhaps also as a spiritual greeting to hopefully our newest intercessor. We pray for his repose, his family, and in thanksgiving for the gift of his priesthood and his spiritual Fatherhood that he gave to everyone he met.

Follow the links below to see some of Fr. Sofie’s excellent conference recordings and written materials in our bookstore.