He lived a noble, global life — but it was the everyday things that made the Rev. Philip Wallace stand out.

When he looked someone in the eyes, for instance, he gave his full attention.

"He was totally centered on the person he was talking to," said Kathleen Havens, a longtime parishioner at St. Louise Catholic Church in Bellevue, where the Rev. Wallace was pastor emeritus. "To me, it really spoke volumes."

Said the Rev. Tom Belleque, the church's pastor: "He made everyone he met feel like they were the most important person in the world."

The Rev. Wallace, 75, died Thursday, Aug. 25, after a 10-year-battle with cancer.

Born in Sault Ste. Marie, Ontario, the Rev. Wallace was proud of his Canadian heritage — especially when the Vancouver Canucks made it to the National Hockey League playoffs, Belleque said.

The Rev. Wallace attended St. Jerome's College (now St. Jerome's University) in Waterloo, Ontario, graduating in May 1960, according to a biography posted on the Flintofts Funeral Home website.

He soon joined Maryknoll, the Catholic mission based in New York.

From there, the Rev. Wallace was asked to take up posts in Chicago, Seattle and Boston — as well as Tanzania, then a newly independent nation in East Africa

In Tanzania, he worked to help the government form small communities where water, education and health care would be more accessible. He also worked with secondary students in a regional school and performed parish work, according to the biography.

The Rev. Wallace was later assigned to Boston, where he established the Center for Justice Concerns. He also worked with Sister Maura Clarke, the Maryknoll sister who was murdered in El Salvador in 1980 with three other missionaries. The women were slain by a military death squad as they were returning from the airport.

In 1983, a one-year assignment with St. Francis of Assisi Church in Burien turned into a 15-year commitment.

In 1998, the Rev. Wallace was assigned to St. Louise in Bellevue, where he served a variety of roles, from pastor to school-board member to dean for parishes on the Eastside. He stepped down as pastor in 2001 after he was diagnosed with multiple myeloma, a form of cancer, but agreed to serve as an assistant pastor until he retired in 2005.

In August that year, he returned to East Africa to visit Tanzania and climb Mount Kilimanjaro.

Yet he still continued to help out at St. Louise.

"Right up until he got so sick this summer, he was still celebrating Mass here and actively involved in the community," Belleque said. "He was in more pain than he ever let on, yet he chose to serve. In the middle of this pain and suffering, he thought of others."

The Rev. Wallace had a tremendous sense of humor, a dynamic presence and was very personal, he said. When he was too weak to stand, he said Mass at a table. "Even then, he could speak so eloquently," said Havens, now of Winthrop, but formerly of Bellevue and Seattle.

Havens and her husband, Walt, have been members of the parish for 32 years.

When sex-abuse scandals rocked the Catholic Church, and some parishioners began to question the hierarchy, the Rev. Wallace urged them to keep their faith and instead focus on the community, Havens said.

Havens said she was most impressed by the Rev. Wallace's "total acceptance of others."

When a priest from elsewhere publicly said gays should not receive Communion, he said in his homily that week that if he couldn't give Communion to everyone who wanted it, "That'll be the last time I say Mass."

"The whole church stood up and started clapping," Havens said. Of all the people she has met, Havens said, the Rev. Wallace was the one who most seemed like Jesus.

The Rev. Wallace is survived by a brother, Bill Wallace, of Bellevue; two sisters, Sheelah Zapf, of Edmonton, Alberta; and Rosemarie MacDonald, of Kingston, Ontario; and several nieces and nephews.

A vigil service was held Tuesday at St. Francis. A funeral Mass will be held at 11 a.m. Wednesday, Aug. 31, at St. Louise, 141 156th Ave. S.E., Bellevue, followed by a reception.

Jeff Hodson: 206-464-2109 or jhodson@seattletimes.com