Alumni Spotlight - Fumi Tosu
Welcome back, Mr. Fumiaki Tosu! We're thrilled to reconnect with an esteemed member of our alumni family. Fumi graduated with his M.Div. from JST in 2003 and was elected to be the class speaker for commencement. After graduation, he led a Catholic Worker House in San Jose for several years after teaching at Bellarmine High School in San Jose. For the past several years, Fumii has been managing a Catholic Worker House called the Dandelion House in Portland, Oregon.
At JST, Fumi says he experienced a community of "loving, caring, and curious people who are all trying to live into what it means to profess a faith that makes a difference for justice in the world." This formative experience has deeply influenced Fumi's journey, leading him from teaching high school social justice to active participation in the Catholic Worker Movement. Fumi talks about JST as a place where he learned to think theologically. JST exposed him to different ways of understanding what it meant to be human and relate to the Divine. In the midst of climate crisis, shifting narratives in society, and questioning, he still clings to the Gospels as the story he wants to live into, a story of compassion, prophetic resistance, and the renewing power of the Spirit of God.
At the heart of his engagement in the world is his commitment to the idea of personalism, "The Catholic Worker emphasizes "personalism" - the idea that we have a personal responsibility to practice the Works of Mercy and care for those in need around us. We can't outsource compassion to social service agencies, churches, or the government - we have to be compassionate people in our daily actions. What humans most need, whether they are obviously suffering (like our unhoused neighbors) or not - is to be seen, and heard, and known. And we can only be seen, heard, and known as individuals by other individuals."
Fumi's journey is one we needed to hear. As a storyteller himself, he says, "Personal stories are a vehicle for people to connect with one another, in order to build resilient communities at the local level." Thank you, Fumi, for sharing a small part of your story with us!
For more from Fumi on his worldview and his reasons for starting Dandelion House, you can visit the below links:
https://dandelionhouse.org/love-in-action/