Photograph: Father Carl Beekman, Pastor of St.Anthony Catholic Church in Rockford, IL celebrates the Mass for Servant of God Rev. Father Joseph Verbis Lafleur at St. Landry Catholic Church in Opelousas last evening. The chalice that once belonged to Father Lafleur can be seen in the photograph taken by Freddie Herpin.
CAROLA LILLIE HARTLEY
Publisher and Contributing Writer
The living word he heard on that day while saying mass was detachment. “I knew what that meant,” said Father Carl Beekman, Pastor of St. Anthony Catholic Church in Rockford, IL.
What Father Beekman was referring to was detachment from a chalice that was given to him when he was studying to be a priest over twenty years ago. It was a special chalice that belonged to a special priest — a priest whose life he was celebrating at the Mass held at St. Landry Catholic Church in Opelousas last evening. That priest was Servant of God, Reverend Father Joseph Verbis Lafleur.
Father Lafleur had that chalice after he was ordained a priest in 1938. He used it when he celebrated his first Solemn Mass at St. Landry Catholic Church on April 5, 1938. And it was used at the Mass last evening in that same church. It was also the focus of the homily Father Beekman gave at the Mass. Father Lafleur’s chalice connected the lives of three priest who used it during their service to the Catholic Church.
Servant of God Reverend Father Joseph Verbis Lafleur
Born in Ville Platte, LA on January 24, 1912, Joseph Verbis Lafleur was the son of Valentine Lafleur and Agatha Dupre Lafleur. He later moved with his family to Opelousas, the seat of St Landry Parish in Louisiana.
As a young boy Verbis Lafleur always expressed his desire to become a priest. During his teenage years, he entered the seminary, completed 11 years of studies at St. Joseph’s Seminary in St. Benedict, LA and Notre Dame Seminary in New Orleans and was ordained a priest for the Diocese of Lafayette on April 2, 1938, at St. John the Evangelist Cathedral in Lafayette. Just prior to his ordination, Lafleur chose his chalice that he later used for services as a priest. Following his ordination, it was officially presented to him at a program during a reception given in his honor following his first Low Mass celebrated at St. Landry Catholic Church on April 3, 1938. Barbara Ann and Rose Evelyn Sylvester, nieces of Father Lafleur, made the presentation of the chalice at that reception.
Following ordination, Father Lafleur was assigned to St. Mary Magdalen Catholic Church in Abbeville, LA. While he was serving at that church, in the summer of 1941 he felt the call to also serve his country. He asked to join the military, and after first being refused, he was eventually given permission by his bishop and became a chaplain in the Army Air Corps. Before he left for his military service, he gave the chalice he used to his family in Opelousas for safe keeping.
After first reporting to Albuquerque, New Mexico, Chaplain Lafleur was sent to Clark Field in the Philippine Islands, arriving just a few weeks before it was attacked by the Japanese on December 8, 1941. He became a prisoner of war for approximately two and a half years including stays at Davao and Lasang. On September 7, 1944, Father Lafleur gave his life while helping others to escape a torpedoed hell ship carrying over 700 POWs.
Because of his efforts during the war, Father Lafleur was awarded the Distinguished Service Cross (twice), the Purple Heart and the Bronze Star. His Cause of Canonization was opened by the Diocese of Lafayette on September 5, 2020, and he became a Servant of God in 2021.
Father Wilfred James Sylvester
Before Father Lafleur was ordained, he met with his nephew Wilfred Sylvester and during that visit showed him the chalice that he would use after becoming a priest. Immediately the nephew liked it and expressed his desire to one day have that chalice. Father Lafleur told him if he entered the seminary, studied hard and became a priest, he could possibly have it.
Wilfred Sylvester did enter the seminary, and he was ordained a priest on May 10, 1952. Just as his uncle Verbis promised, he received that chalice he always wanted, as it was willed to him following the death of Father Lafleur.
Following in his uncle’s footsteps, Father Will became an Army Chaplain, serving with the National Guard for many years. He also served the Diocese of Lafayette in different church parishes including those in Opelousas, New Iberia, Coteau Homes, Washington and Eunice. He died in 1999.
Father Carl Beekman
Carl Beekman spent his childhood growing up as a Methodist in a working-class family in Bedford, Indiana. He credits his upbringing with developing a strong work ethic. Although his father wanted him to further his education following high school, instead he enlisted in the Marines where he learned the skills to “improvise, adapt, and overcome.”
Following his military service, he came to Southwest Louisiana to meet a friend he knew while in the Marines. The friend’s father offered him the chance to manage a health care holding company and he started on the path of becoming a successful entrepreneur. But his life began to change, and he acknowledged he was having problems adjusting to life after the military.
He started attending Mass at St. Anthony’s Catholic Church in Eunice, and he eventually became a Catholic. After a girlfriend broke off what he thought was a serious relationship, and then, when buying items at a gas station convenience store while traveling through Orange, TX, he was approached by a woman who began pointing at him and loudly saying “you’re a priest…. you’re a priest,” he thought he needed to explore the possibility of joining the priesthood.
He approached his own priest who helped him realize he had a calling to the priesthood. He entered the Seminary studying at St. Joseph Seminary College in Covington, LA and at Mount St. Mary Seminary in Emmitsburg, Md. He was ordained to the priesthood by Bishop Thomas G. Doran at the Cathedral of St. Peter on May 20, 2000.
Following ordination, Father Beekman requested assignment to the Rockford Diocese in Illinois to be near friends he knew from his days in the seminary. He served the diocese in various positions and today is the Pastor of St. Anthony Padua Parish in Rockford, IL, having been appointed in June of this year.
Father Lafleur’s Chalice
The story of how the lives of Father Lafleur, Father Sylvester and Father Beekman intertwined around that chalice once used by Servant of God Rev. Father Joseph Verbis Lafleur, and how Father Beekman came to have it, is an interesting one.
While he was attending services at St. Anthony’s Church in Eunice, LA, Beekman met Father Wilfred Sylvester, who became his friend. After being in the seminary for a year, he returned to Eunice, where he met with Father Sylvester again. Father asked him if he had a chalice yet. Beekman told him he thought that was premature since he had only studied for one year. He said he would have a chalice when the time was right.
Father Sylvester told him having a chalice is really saying you are ready to be a priest. He then showed him a chalice he said once belonged to his uncle, who he called “a real good man.” He went on to tell him how his uncle died in WWII, and that chalice belonging to the uncle was willed to him when he finished his studies and was ordained a priest.
Later, when it was time for Beekman to have a chalice, Father Sylvester gave the chalice that belonged to Father Lafleur to him and told him: “Do not give it to anyone. I do not want it in a museum.” After his ordination, Father Beekman brought the chalice with him to the Diocese of Rockford in Illinois.
Father Beekman used the chalice every day when he said Daily Mass. Several years ago, he received a phone call from Rev. Tom Voorhies, pastor at Sacred Heart Catholic Church in Ville Platte, LA. The two priests had become friends when Father Beekman was in Louisiana. During the phone call, Father Beekman asked Father Voorhies if he wanted the chalice, and he told him no, he was just checking in with a friend. Although Father Beekman felt at some time the chalice should be brought back to Louisiana, he was not ready to let it go, at least not yet, so he did not offer to return it.
Every day before Father Beekman said daily mass, he asked God to send him a living word at some time during the mass celebration. On this one day, during the second concentration of the Mass as he was raising the chalice, he suddenly heard the word detachment. Soon after that Mass, he called Father Voorhies and said he was ready to detach from the chalice and send it back to the Diocese of Lafayette.
To make sure the chalice got back safely, Father James Brady, pastor of St. Landry Catholic Church at that time, along with Father Lafleur’s nephew Richard Lafleur and his wife Carrol, traveled to Rockford, Illinois to pick up the chalice and bring it back to Louisiana. It was placed at St. Landry Catholic Church in Opelousas for a while, and today is at Sacred Heart Church in Ville Platte, LA, the parish where Father Lafleur was Baptized, made his first Confession, received his First Communion and his Confirmation.
Father Carl Beekman, along with twelve other priests and deacons, celebrated the mass last evening for Servant of God Reverend Father Joseph Verbis Lafleur, marking the 78th anniversary of Father Lafleur death on September 7, 1944. Father Beekman gave the homily, where he told the story of the chalice he was using for the Mass to the faithful in attendance.
