‘God Gave You Hope’: Mass honors the 50-year faith journey of Houston-area Vietnamese Catholics

Vietnamese Catholic youth process with a reliquary of the Vietnamese Martyrs during a procession at the Co-Cathedral of the Sacred Heart in Houston on Nov. 26, remembering the 50th anniversary of the arrival of Vietnamese refugees to the U.S. (Photo by Hung L. Truong Photography)HOUSTON — On Nov. 27, more than a 1,200 Vietnamese Catholics from around the Archdiocese attended a special Mass at the Co-Cathedral of the Sacred Heart in downtown Houston.

The celebration marked 50 years since the first Vietnamese Catholic refugees arrived in the Archdiocese in 1975, following the fall of Saigon and the end of the Vietnam War.

The event began with a solemn liturgical procession around the co-cathedral in honor of Our Lady of La Vang and the Vietnamese Martyrs followed by Mass presided by Archbishop Joe S. Vásquez. A large reliquary containing several relics of the Vietnamese Martyrs, a group of 117 Catholics, 96 Vietnamese, 11 Spanish, and 10 French who were canonized by then-pope St. John Paul II in 1988, was also processed through the streets of downtown Houston.

At least 20 priests, many Vietnamese themselves, concelebrated the Mass with assistance by deacons, religious and seminarians. Many other lay Catholic groups also attended, including the Vietnamese Eucharistic Youth Movement.

“We express gratitude to God for the 50 years that the Vietnamese Catholics have been celebrating Mass at the Co-Cathedral of the Sacred Heart. It is important to remember your history, where you came from, and how you came to be where you are. You are here today not by chance or luck. No, you are here because God brought you here. He gave you hope,” Archbishop Vásquez said.


The first Vietnamese person was baptized at the co-cathedral in 1975, according to sacramental records, he said. In 1981, Monsignor Phillipe Le Xuan Thuong was assigned to the co-cathedral, and under his leadership the Vietnamese Catholic community grew and organized.

After Mass, exhibits at the co-cathedral’s campus drew visitors to view relics and the history of the Vietnamese Martyrs, information on the mass Exodus after the fall of Saigon, and the 50-year faith journey of Vietnamese Catholics in the Archdiocese. There was a special screening of a documentary featuring local Vietnamese Catholics who arrived in the U.S. as refugees, capturing their experience as an immigrant faith community living in the Archdiocese.

“I came to this country as a refugee from Vietnam in 1975 after the fall of Saigon of South Vietnam to the communist, and I first landed in Fort Chaffee, Arkansas,” said Father Phero Chu Ngọc Thành, a retired priest in the Archdiocese. “I remember there were about 20,000 Vietnamese refugees when I came to Fort Chaffee [in Arkansas], and at least half of that population were Catholics.”

Fort Chaffee served as a major resettlement center for more than 50,000 Vietnamese, Laotian, and Cambodian refugees in 1975 who were relocated across the country, including Houston.

Father Dat Hoang, pastor at St. Faustina Catholic Church, said the early days in the Archdiocese were super challenging. He was among the refugees who left Vietnam by boat in 1988 for Thailand as a 12-year-old, leaving his family and home to pursue his vocation to the priesthood.

“It was hard to communicate without parents around. It was very lonely, challenging and difficult,” he said. “But we were not alone. I noticed that a lot of Vietnamese friends and just the community in general came here with little knowledge of the language, a completely different culture, but everybody was just persevering and working hard, and the thing that brought a lot of consolation and joy to the heart was I couldn’t wait for the weekend to be able to go to Mass in Vietnamese. It was our source of consolation and strength, and I thank God for the faith.”

After the fall of Saigon, an exodus of families fled Vietnam, and the Ford administration began planning how to respond to the humanitarian crisis. The U.S. State Department and U.S. bishops identified Houston as an ideal location to accept Vietnamese refugees due to its job market and a large Catholic community.

Embraced under the leadership of Bishop John L. Morkovsky, who immediately heard the urgent call to help these families, the Vietnamese Catholic community grew into a vibrant, faith-filled ministry that contributes profoundly to the life of the local Church.  

Father Steven Tran, parochial vicar at the Co-Cathedral, published a special magazine to highlight the community’s first years of resettlement in the U.S., the founding of Vietnamese parishes and ministries in the Archdiocese, rise of vocations, youth programs, cultural traditions and the community’s growth into one of the largest Vietnamese Catholic populations in the U.S.

“This celebration truly has been a labor of love, prepared over many months with the dedication of countless individuals, ministries and collaborators,” Father Tran said. “Our hope has been to honor not only the sacrifices of our ancestors, but also the grace, perseverance and unity that have sustained our community through five decades.”

Today, according to the U.S. Census Bureau, at least 2.3 million Vietnamese Americans live in the U.S., with more than 310,000 residing in Texas. More than half call the Houston metropolitan area home, the most out of any other major metropolitan area outside of California. 

The Center for Applied Research in the Apostolate (CARA) at Georgetown University reported that 700,000 of the population are Catholic, and Archdiocesan ministry officials estimate there are at least 36,000 Vietnamese Catholics in the Archdiocese, many who are parishioners at the 10 parishes with clergy and ministry leaders dedicated to serving them and their families. 

While only Vietnamese Catholics make up only just over 2% of the Archdiocese’s 1.7 million Catholics, they comprised 4% of all men ordained to the priesthood in the U.S. in 2022, a 2022 CARA survey said.

Several Vietnamese women religious congregrations also continue  leading ministries in the Archdiocese, including the Lovers of the Holy Cross and the Dominican Sisters of Mary Immaculate Province, among others.

“This event is an expression of gratitude to God, who has guided our people through persecution and exile, to our ancestors in the faith, who handed down perseverance and devotion, and to the local Church, which welcomed our community with generosity and compassion,” Father Tran said. ​