Slain Catholic college professor had been discerning diaconate

Published: 2008-02-20

OAKLAND, Calif. (CNS) -- Just a week before he was shot to death, John Alfred Pierre Dennis, a professor at St. Mary's College in Moraga, had attended his second class in a pastoral ministry program for the Diocese of Oakland. Dennis, 59, had enrolled in the program to discern whether he was called to become an ordained deacon, said Father Jay Matthews, Dennis' pastor at St. Benedict Parish in Oakland. "He wanted to serve the church even more than he was already doing," the priest told The Catholic Voice, diocesan newspaper of Oakland. Dennis was found shot to death in his car near a San Mateo County beach late in the evening of Feb. 9. Troy Thomas, 43, a recent parolee who had once been in a student outreach program run by Dennis, was arrested in connection with the crime when police discovered Dennis' body in the back seat of a car Thomas was driving. Oakland police said evidence at Dennis' home indicated he was shot there during a violent confrontation.

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