Young Brother – Brother Chân Pháp Đệ

Adrian Aloysius Stier, born May 8, 1935, in Grand Meadow, to Alvin and Marcella Stier, died Aug. 4, 2016, in Escondido, California where he was a resident at Deer Park Monastery. As a monastic, he was known as Brother Chân Pháp Đệ or “Young Brother.” During his lifetime, Br. Pháp Đệ was a Catholic priest, a stock broker, a husband, and a parent. He died following complications of heart surgery. At the time of his death he was surrounded by his daughter, friends, relatives, and his monastic family, with chanting and song. The love was very powerful.

The memories and stories of knowing Brother Pháp Đệ are endless. Many have been shared since his death in August. Our Young Brother was well known for his enjoyment of singing. This recording of the Great Bell Chant was made at the Rising Tide Meditation Hall at Magnolia Grove Monastery, Batesville, Mississippi. In the accompanying photo, he leans on the shoulder of his daughter Jessica.

We have also been offered the gift of many years of teaching and sharing from our Young Brother. Thanks to Sister Chân Trăng Hải Ấn, who compiled and edited the richness of these teachings, we can offer them here for you in one place.

Teachings of a Young Brother (89-page PDF)

Here is an excerpt where Brother Pháp Đệ shares about himself and his journey.

I was brought up in an Irish-German traditional Catholic family.  I became an altar boy at 13 and the local priest was my hero.  I used to do daily mass with him and go out to do sick calls. I became an enthusiastic participant in my Catholic religion so much so that I went off at age 15 to Catholic seminary and became a priest at age 26.  Through the years as a priest I began to find difficulties – disagreements with Rome and the Vatican, and not experiencing the brotherhood that I was looking for.  I resigned in 1970.  Part of that was meeting Dan Berrigan and he woke me up to what was going on in Vietnam.  I left the priesthood and went out into the world to work with criminals, to continue what I saw as the work of Jesus.

In 1993 I was a stockbroker and in chemotherapy for stage IV lymphoma.  On the bed-stand of my partner was a copy of The Miracle of Mindfulness.  That was my first taste of  Thich Nhat Hanh (Thay) and it had a good influence on me.  For instance, I stopped watching TV while eating dinner, I drove the car without listening to the radio and I ran along the Mississippi River without my walkman, just listening to nature.  Those were the early influences of Thay on me.  Then in 1997, with a new partner who became my fiance, we went to Plum Village and we were very moved by it.  We returned to Minnesota to begin Sangha building.  In 2000 we moved to Santa Barbara and helped form a residential lay practice community there.

During this time I had the good opportunity to sit in the orchard at Green Mountain Dharma Center in Vermont with Thay and talk about many things including Dan Berrigan and my experience of the Peace Movement.  I also had the good experience of going to China with Thay in 1999.  In that trip I had just finished reading Thay’s new book, Going Home: Jesus and Buddha as Brothers. I said, “Thay, I think you understand Jesus better than all the great theology teachers I had in the 50’s and the 60’s.”  And I had good ones.  He simply said, “That’s because I have Jesus in my heart.”  Since then, he has been for me the best example of a Living Christ in my life and he’s the reason why I’m here as a monk.

In 2002, October, recovering from the separation from my fiance and reading the life of St Francis of Assisi, I thought, “He’s just like Thay!”  Then I thought, “Why not me?” I had a sense then that I didn’t need another romance, I didn’t need any more money (I had just retired).  I said, “There’s more and Thay is the man that’s got it.”  I think we call that spiritual greed.

On July 3, I ordained and Thay said my name, “Chan Phap De.”  Everybody laughed and I learned that it meant “Young Brother.”  I was 68.  Years later, I heard Thay say, “The reason I made you ‘Young Brother’ is because they used to call you Father.”  He’s got a sense of humor.  I felt fully embraced by Thay and understood by him.  I feel very lucky.

The experience of the community has been a very powerful training ground for me.  Living in the world, my tendency is to get things done and to do things my way.  If people didn’t cooperate and go along with me, I’d write them off and move on and get stuff done.  I’m learning in the practice to recognize my compulsion, or addiction, to be busy and to get results my way.  Being a monk has taught me about letting go.  I’m experiencing more peace, more joy, and better health.  For me, it’s still a challenge to really embrace our interbeing-ness and to really be there for my brother or sister without being critical.

My biggest challenge has been in the last three or four years.  Thay has asked me to help Westerners to get in touch with their own spiritual roots.  I said, “Thay, everybody I know is so happy with the mindfulness practice.  They don’t miss their old religion.”  He said, “I don’t buy that.  It’s in their blood.”  I’m realizing more and more that most of us don’t really realize that.

I’m having to get back in touch with those Catholic roots, with Thay’s insistence.  I’m discovering what sabotaged my priesthood and early life.  It was dualistic thinking.  I was a very good salesman and I was a very popular teacher in the sixties but I was caught up in the notions rather than the real lived insights.  I was caught up in good theology and the best of the latest thinking but not really experiencing an intimate connection with God and with Jesus.  This practice and Thay’s teaching has helped me to discover what happened back there that I didn’t understand.  Now it’s providing me also with the challenge to dig in and help others to go back and connect.  Recently in Hong Kong, I said, “Thay, I don’t think that I’m up for this effort to help Westerners get back in touch with the Church.”  And Thay just looked at me and he said, “You’ve got to be a revolutionary.  We need a new Christianity.”  I’m still in the process of stepping up to that.

Another important teaching for me is on Earth Holding.  Thay is teaching us how to love and understand who our Mother Earth is.  For me, again as an old Christian Catholic, I learned that earth is a place of exile because our ancestors committed sins.  The earth is a place that we are being tested. Which is bad theology, not recognizing that we’re here are a blessing.  And God is not some being looking at us saying that we’d better get baptized or else – that he’s somehow upset with us.  or she’s upset with us.  The earth our Mother, and Thay says it so well, gave birth to Jesus and to Buddha and to us.  Our practice is to really learn on a daily basis how to cherish Holy Mother Earth, in the flowers and in each other.

Feel free to comment your own story and experience of our Young Brother in the comments. If we discover additional resources to share, they will be added to this page in the future.