Welcome to Rev. Jim F. Chamberlain, Ph.D., our newly appointed Parochial Vicar. He joins fellow priests Fr. Francisco, Fr. Juan Diego, and Msgr. Louis.
Born and raised in east Texas, Fr. Jim’s love of the outdoors came from Scouting and family camping trips and canoeing excursions on Texas and Arkansas rivers. He eventually earned a bachelor’s degree (Texas A&M) and a Ph.D. (Clemson) in environmental engineering. Following in his older brother’s footsteps (Fr. Tom Chamberlain), Fr. Jim was ordained to the Diocese of Austin and has served as Catholic campus minister at Baylor University and in several other parish assignments. In 2006, while living with Jesuit fathers, he taught Environmental Science and did campus ministry work at Spring Hill College in Mobile, Alabama. His training in Ignatian spirituality and his work under the Jesuit fathers have prepared him well for a full life of pastoral ministry and academia.
In 2007, Jim started a professional chapter of Engineers Without Borders in Austin and has been working on water system projects in El Salvador and elsewhere ever since. For the past 10 years, he served as Co-Director of the University of Oklahoma's WaTER Center. The WaTER (Water Technologies for Emerging Regions) Center’s mission is to develop and promote sustainable drinking water and sanitation technologies in emerging regions. He has led water and development projects in Uganda, Ethiopia, and Cambodia, and was actively engaged in research, teaching, and service activities with college students on the OU campus. While in Oklahoma Fr. Jim also served as pastor of two Catholic parishes in Purcell and Pauls Valley.
Fr. Jim is a musician (guitar and banjo) and enjoys running, cycling, and backpacking. He has fulfilled a lifelong dream by building a log cabin with a friend in the mountains of western North Carolina near Asheville. This cabin is his “getaway place” whenever he gets a chance to get away. In his prayer and life, he seeks (and finds) God “in all things” as all of creation mediates the presence of a loving Creator and Redeemer.
