Francis Xavier Seelos, CSsR (January 11, 1819 – October 4, 1867) was a German Redemptorist who worked as a missionary in the United States frontier.

[1] Seelos was touched by the letters published in the Catholic newspaper Sion, from the Redemptorist missionaries describing the lack of spiritual care for the thousands of German-speaking immigrants.

He was accepted by the Redemptorists on November 22, 1842, and sailed the following year from Le Havre, France, on March 17, arriving in New York on April 20, 1843.

On December 22, 1844, after having completed his novitiate and theological studies, Seelos was ordained a priest in the Redemptorist Church of St. James in Baltimore, Maryland.

[3] Seelos's availability and innate kindness in understanding and responding to the faithful's needs quickly made him well known as an expert confessor and spiritual director, so much so that people came to him even from neighboring towns.

Above all, he strove to instill in these future Redemptorist missionaries the enthusiasm, spirit of sacrifice, and apostolic zeal for the people's spiritual and temporal welfare.

Having been excused from this responsibility by Pope Pius IX, from 1863 until 1866, he dedicated himself to the life of an itinerant missionary preaching in English and German in the states of Connecticut, Illinois, Michigan, Missouri, New Jersey, New York, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island and Wisconsin.

[4] Seelos notably preached a two-week parish mission at St. Mary of Victories Church in St. Louis, Missouri in October 1865.

Francis Xavier Seelos invites the members of the Church to deepen their union with Christ in the sacraments of Penance and the Eucharist.