The second of six children from a loving Catholic family, Fr. Pier Giorgio Dengler grew up outside New York City, attending Our Lady of Perpetual Help parish in Pelham, NY.  He received a Bachelor’s degree from Fordham University and a Masters from Columbia University.  He worked with language-impaired special education students in the Bronx for a number of years and became more and more active with various Catholic organizations in the New York area before finally meeting the Dominicans. “The lives and witness of Dominican saints, from St. Dominic to Bl. Pier Giorgio Frassati, speak to my heart.  Their joy in the Lord and zeal for the salvation of souls called me to follow Christ as a Dominican friar.”