Fr. James Niles Gillen Obituary

Four things:
1. When someone responded with a stupid answer, Fr. would say, "Ahhh Keeee!"
2. Punishment with the black belt was always flat across the butt, which was less painful than Fr Marcel who had a flick of the wrist causing a sharp pain.
3. I was in Algebra class from him, if I remember correctly.
4. He was an amazing man: serious, caring, thoughtful, and direct.

Fr Niles was a good man. He gave me a lifeline when I was a student at Mt Carmel.
May he rest in peace.

At Carmel I had Father Niles for Geometry. In his role as guidance counselor he arranged for me to attend DePaul University in Chicago with the help of a partial tuition scholarship from the Pullman Foundation. Father Niles arranged all this for me and got me started on the right road to life. I'll always remember what he did for me. He was a very nice man. Herb Burdett

Have a safe journey and Rest In Peace my friend, you had a great run and will be missed.

My sympathies to the Gillen Family and the Carmelite Friars on the death of one of the finest of men anywhere. It was a great sadness for me to see news of Fr. Niles´ death.

I want to share an anecdote. When I was a student at Joliet Catholic High School (Class of 1969), where Father Niles was Principal, there was a vigorous campaign to keep students out of the classroom corridors during class time. If we were caught in a hallway without permission during a class period, we would be punished. Father Niles´ obituary mentions that he took a sabbatical at the School of Applied Theology in Berkeley, California, in the early 2000s. That sabbatical program was housed in the one unused wing of St. Albert the Great Dominican Priory, in Oakland, California. At the time Father Niles made his sabbatical, I was the Prior (Father Superior) of Saint Albert´s, so in a way, one could say I was the sabbatical community´s landlord.

It was great fun having my former high school Principal in the same house. Furthermore, one of my high school classmates and buddies, Brother Edward Arambasich, O.F.M., was also on the sabbatical program that semester with Father Niles.

One day Brother Ed and I had agreed to go out for supper, but at St. Albert´s we had certain community prayers that we said just before supper (including the De Profundis for our deceased) and then, before going into the refectory, the Prior made whatever news or announcements he had for the day. I told Brother Ed I had to attend the De Profundis before we could leave, and I did so. After that, the community of fifty or so friars went into the refectory and Brother Ed and I scurried in the opposite direction to leave the house. We were in a bit of a hurry because of our concern for the heavy Bay Bridge traffic. We were actually at a slow run and as we crossed a corridor at an intersection, there was Fr. Niles coming down the hall! As soon as we spotted him, the two of us spontaneously came to a screeching halt, regressing by four decades back to our mischievous high school world, scared that we had been caught by the Principal for being in the hallway! We had a good laugh when we came to our senses.

He preferred, of course, that we think of one another as friends rather than as students and Principal of an earlier era, but he also let us know that he was proud of what we had done with our lives. We hadn´t entered Carmel, but we did follow him and his brethren into the religious life and that pleased him.
May this extraordinary man rest in peace.
Father Michael Monshau, O.P. Joliet Catholic High School Class of 1965

I met Father Niles when he can to OLMC in Louisville Ky.We became friends ,he was a fine man who i respected very much.I have thought about him often since he left.He was a true man of God who will be missed by many.God bless you my friend rest in peace.