FR. BRANDON DANG IS no stranger to the golf course.
“I usually play with three other priests,” said Fr. Brandon Dang, administrator of Corpus Christi Catholic Church in Aliso Viejo. “But it’s on our day off – and we have a blast!”
That foursome also includes Fr. Duy Le, pastor of San Francisco Solano Church in Rancho Santa Margarita, Fr. Aristotle Quan, parochial vicar at St. Edward the Confessor Catholic Church in Dana Point and Fr. Michael Nguyen, parochial administrator at Santa Clara de Asís Catholic Church in Yorba Linda.
But golf wasn’t always in Fr. Brandon’s repertoire.
FR. BRANDON DANG PREPARES TO ADDRESS THE BALL ON A TEE SHOT AT TIJERAS CREEK GOLF CLUB NEAR RANCHO SANTA MARGARITA. PHOTO COURTESY OF FR. BRANDON DANG
In fact, growing up, he had such a love for basketball and the Los Angeles Lakers, that he often dreamed about becoming a professional basketball player.
“As the years went by and I got older,” he recalled, “I understood that the chances of me getting drafted by the Lakers were rather slim.”
Actually, the first time Fr. Brandon even picked up a golf club was when he was a seminarian intern at St. Joachim Catholic Church in Costa Mesa in 2013.
“I had a few seminarian and priest friends who wanted to start playing, so I started ‘hacking’ at it for a few months.”
He added, “But I needed to go back to the seminary to finish my studies, plus my playing was plagued by an injury. And I ‘hung it up’, so to speak.”
After his priestly ordination in 2016 and his first parish assignment at Our Lady Queen of Angels Catholic Church in Newport Beach, he would go to the driving range and play in golf tournaments at the parish school.
“It wasn’t until the end of 2021 that I picked it up as a full-time hobby when a very sweet couple, Bob and Anna Niki, invited me to play at Ben Brown’s Golf Course in Laguna Beach.
“It just snowballed from there!”
One of the members of the golf foursome, Fr. Aristotle, chuckled when he recalled some moments while they were out hitting the links.
“There’s the time that Fr. Brandon sliced off a ball from the tee and hit a duck in the pond,” Fr. Aristotle shared. “We still tease him for that.”
He added: “Fr. Brandon is so addicted to golf that he will play two rounds of golf back-to-back! Or he will play with random people because he is so social.
“Fr. Duy Le and I tease him since neither one of us will play with random people. Fr. Brandon calls people he just met ‘his buddy’ and we make fun of him for that.”
But Fr. Duy Le said that Fr. Brandon’s outgoing nature is also an excellent trait.
“I am very quiet,” shared Fr. Duy Le. “Sometimes I’m shy and not very social so Fr. Brandon’s outgoing nature makes me step outside and engage with others.”
Fr. Michael knows that Fr. Brandon is a good priest who sets his priorities.
“As a good priest, Fr. Brandon will never say no when someone asks him to hear their Confession or if someone is in need of Anointing of the Sick,” Fr. Michael said. “Likewise, he also won’t say no to anyone that invites him out for a round of golf!”
There was a period of about three months, Fr. Brandon took a different day off than the usual Thursdays. The rest of the group stopped playing golf for that time, but Fr. Brandon continued to play.
“For some reason, Fr. Brandon’s lowest scores and best rounds of golf are when he doesn’t play with us (his regular foursome),” Fr. Michael observed.
And about that elusive hole-in-one?
“My game has been up and down,” Fr. Brandon said. “But it has been a wonderful addition to my hobbies and a nice transition from basketball as my knees have started to get a little creaky.”