Fr. Bernard was born in Saigon, South Vietnam, in 1961, the fifth child in a family of ten children. He has three brothers and six sisters. He went to a minor seminary in 1973 for seventh and eighth grades. His whole family fled from Vietnam in 1975 at the fall of South Vietnam into Communism. They were evacuated to the United States because his father was working for the American embassy. While in the refugee camp at Wake Island, Fr. Bernard met the brothers and priests of a Vietnamese religious community known as the Congregation of the Mother Coredemptrix (now called the Congregation of the Mother of the Redeemer). He joined the community in Carthage, Missouri. He studied theology at Notre Dame Seminary in 1992-1996. He was ordained to priesthood in the community in 1997. In 2002, he was assigned to be an associate pastor at the Vietnamese parish in Port Arthur TX. In 2005, he requested to join the diocese of Austin at the time under Bishop Gregory Aymond, who was the rector of Notre Dame seminary when Fr. Bernard studied there. He was assigned to St. Joseph parish in Killeen as an associate pastor and accepted into the diocese. In 2007, he was assigned as the pastor of St. Charles Borromeo parish in Kingsland, in 2013, the pastor of St. Mary in Caldwell, and in 2019, the pastor of St. Paul in Smithville. He likes playing piano, guitar, singing, swimming, fishing, running and snowboarding.