Pictures of Father Peter's Dream

St. Peter Catholic Church (Front) Eziala, Owerri

St. Peter Catholic Church (Side) Eziala, Owerri

St. Peter Catholic Church (Side) Eziala, Owerri

St. Peter Catholic Church (Side) Eziala, Owerri

St. Peter Catholic Church (Inside) Eziala, Owerri

St. Peter Catholic Church (Alter) Eziala, Owerri

TRIBUTE FROM ARCHDIOCESE
OF SAINT PAUL AND MINNEAPOLIS, U.S.A.

I bring to the family the condolences and prayers of Archdiocese and of the people of the Parishes he served. Father peter was a generous and hardworking priest, and a brother to all of us. Please accept also the sympathy of the people of the Church of Saint Peter Claver in Saint Paul Minnesota. Father Peter lived with us several years while he was a student at the University of Saint Thomas. Father served the people of Saint Peter Claver. In more recent years he became the unofficial chaplain to the Nigerian (and
especially Igbo) people present in our Archdiocese. He and I celebrated weddings, baptisms, memorial masses and other occasions together. He was admired by the Nigerians of Minnesota as an elder brother, Pastor and Teacher. Finally, I share my own personal sadness, Father Peter was my friend. We shared many meals together. He was a pastor to my own family at times. My parents and my brothers and sisters send their love and prayers. I will be remembering Father Peter at our Masses this weekend and on November 24. You too will be in our hearts and prayers.

Signed:
REV. KEVIN M. MCDONOUGH, J.C.D.
VICAR GENERAL
ARCHDIOCESE OF SAINT PAUL AND MINNEAPOLIS,
U.S.A.
_____________________________________________________________

Reverend Father Peter Chukwuma Njoku
By Reverend Father Dennis Dease
President of the University of St. Thomas
St. Paul, Minnesota
United States of America

For almost three decades I had the Privilege of counting Father Peter Chukwuma Njoku among my closest friends. The truth be told, he was much like a brother to me than a friend. We were both young priests when he arrived at the University of St. Thomas in Saint Paul, Minnesota in June, 1977 to pursue a degree in mathematics in order to return to Owerri to teach in the seminary. I was preparing for my first year of teaching in the University’s Department of Theology. We both resided in the same student residence hall and gradually became good friends. I was playing a lot of tennis in those days, and Fr. Peter was clearly a natural at it. I was never able to beat him, nor, to my knowledge,
could anyone else. His serves and returns seemed as though shot from a canon and they possessed a lethal accuracy.

He spoke often o that Nigerian homeland that held such an important place in his heart, and of the wonderful Igbo culture. He spoke, too, of his family. They were his life and his love, and their accomplishments were for him a great source of pride and satisfaction.
I never ceased to be amazed with how consistently he could call up with impressive accuracy an apt quotation from classical literature, or William Shakespeare, or the Sacred Scriptures, or an Igbo proverb to shield light on some issue. He was like the householder who could draw forth from his storehouse things both old and new. I remember his sharing with a mutual priest friend of ours who had just been appointed an archbishop an African
adage about how when a chicken is placed in with a new flock, it will stand on one leg for some time. Our Episcopal friend relished this sound advice and practiced it.

_______________________________________________________________

Fare ye well my dear uncle,
Fr. Pee,
I called your line to know how you were doing on Oct 30th. I also wanted to invite you to our house so that you will get to know where we now live in St. Cloud but your phone entered voicemail. The following day being October 31st I got this mail from you.

Chinenye, I am sorry things were so hectic with me. I was going to call you but one thing led to another and I forgot. I am in Nigeria now on a four week vacation. I shall return on the 4th of December.

Fr. Peter.
Your e-mail struck me as a reply to my voicemail to you. I was patiently waiting on Dec 4th and this shocking message got me on Nov 12th. I was in the bathroom getting ready for 10:30 a.m. Sunday mass when Victor broke the news to me through the phone. I lowered myself onto the toilet seat and sat there for over 20 minutes, dazed. I started going over the conversation I had with you on one of our visits to you. You said to me “…who knows how long I have to be around?” I rebuked you on that day and you went on “….Yes. It’s a fact” I also wondered why you took off abruptly to Nigeria. Did you know what was coming? You left my entire family in a state of shock especially my husband who you housed for a while before we joined him. He never got to see you after that day we moved from Georgia to Minnesota. He worked on those days we visited you in the cities.
Fr. Pee, you were an energetic, organized, no nonsense, counselor and disciplinarian.
You did everything humanly possible to take care of yourself; you were so strict with your diet. You were swift to quit anything that did not go down well with your body system. Your presence in the US made your many children here conscious of their actions. It gave us a desire to excel because you were someone people loved telling their success stories.
It will take some time for me to believe that you are gone. Who will call my son Anthony “Tony Surplus’? I keep looking at the pictures we took with you and you look so alive. I know you are alive in God’s bosom because you died in the midst of the people you loved while doing what you loved doing best. Though I am grieved, I console myself because I believe you are resting in the position to help us now. Adieu Fr. Pee, rest in God’s bosom.

From your niece,
Chinenye Chuka-Ipere

________________________________________________________________

Rev. Peter Njoku, March 24, 1946 – November 12, 2006
By Deacon Frank Schneider, St, Jerome Church

On behalf of the whole parish community of St. Jerome of Maplewood, Minnesota,
I wish to extend formally our deepest sympathy to you, Nicole, to you, Fr. Peter’s sisters and brothers with your partners and families, on Fr. Peter’s going forth from us. Our sense of loss is heavy, but we cannot imagine what sense of loss you must feel in these days.

Please know that we pledge to you our prayers in the weeks and months
ahead. How can our human minds ever grasp death? Especially, how can we
understand a death that came too early too quickly? Fr. Peter was her one
moment and gone the next. Breathing, thinking, speaking, caring, and then
gone, leaving a vast empty hole in the hearts of you his biological family and us
his church family.

So, today, as you gather around Fr. Peter’s body, I would invite all of you to
ponder God’s goodness, God’s beatitudes, as we have all experienced it in Fr.
Peter. What struck me most through our ministry together, the conversations
we have shared, was Fr. Peter’s goodness. Plainly put, Fr. Peter was a good man.
Fr. Peter always remembered where he came from. He fondly told stories of his
parents, his brothers and sisters and their partners, and traditions from his
Nigerian roots. He was profoundly centered in his family and his African heritage,
and he delighted in the time he shared with his brothers and sisters and
their partners, his nieces and nephews and his wide circle of friends. To his
family, his friends, his parish, his beliefs and commitments, and to his God, Fr.
Peter’s goodness shows forth in faithfulness.

Fr. Peter was a true friend and pastor to his entire parish community. My wife
Betty and I were proud to call him friend. We enjoyed time together with him in
our home and in his home. The children at St. Jerome’s School enjoyed his visits
to them in the classroom and during their weekly Masses at Church. His homilies
were always meaningful; his door was always open to all who needed him.

Let us pray, the, as this celebration continues that we will learn from Fr. Peter’s
goodness and ourselves be faithful, just and ever-open to our own conversion
into the life of God within us. Let us pray that we will ourselves grow in friendship
with God, the lord of little gifts, and so become for each other and before
God, people who mirror God’s goodness to the world. And may our prayers
rise like incense this day as we give god praise and thanks for the life and love
and goodness-of the friend of God and all of us, Fr. Peter Njoku

________________________________________________________

From Joseph Nnebedum

I met Fr. Peter Njoku 29 years ago, I was a freshman at the University of
Minnesota and he at the College of St. Thomas. We soon became friends.
Fr. Peter was a lot of things to a lot of people. He was a brother, an uncle, a
father, a friend, a parent, a pastor, a counselor, a mediator, a confidant, and
the list goes on and on. To me, Fr. Peter was a friend and today, I am here to
talk about Fr. Peter, my friend. Fr. Peter new how to be a friend and he
made all his friends feel special. He had that unique ability to relate to
people and make them feel like they were best of friends.

Fr. Peter Njoku was born March 24, 1946. He was the 6th of 8 children. His
mother died when he was very young, about 7 years old. Because of his
mother’s death, he learnt at an early age how to cook, clean and do
household chores. Fr. Peter loved to cook, he would often have people over
for diner. Before his father’s death in 1972, his eldest brother Richard had
taken over the responsibilities of raising him and his siblings.
Fr. Peter Njoku was ordained Priest on April 20, 1974 at the Assumpta
Cathedral, in Owerri. After his ordination, he started St. Peter’s Parish in his
hometown, although not yet completed, he built up that church to what it is
today.

Fr. Peter Njoku came to the United States in 1977, after his studies, he
moved back to Nigeria from 1982 to 1987. He came back to the US in 1987
and became a member of the St. Paul and Minneapolis Archdiocese in 2001.
In the 19 years he has served in many Parishes, namely St. Peter Claver in
St. Paul, St. Michael’s in Stillwater, Most Holy Trinity in St. Louis Park,
Chaplain at the United Hospital in St. Paul, St. Michael’s in Pine Island, St.
Paul’s in Zumbrota, St. Philip’s in Minneapolis, St. Mary’s in Bellechester,
Epiphany in Coon Rapids, and his last Parish here at St. Jerome’s. As he
moved from one parish to another so he made friends and would always
keep in-touch. Fr. Peter had very good memory, he would remember phone
numbers, he did not need phone book.

I feel very fortunate to have known Fr. Peter, he touched many lives, and he
did touch my life in a very special way. He was my source of inspiration
and my source of support. I learned a lot from Fr. Peter, what it meant to be
a Christian and to be a friend. Fr. Peter was always there when you need
him, and he was always punctual. I admired his integrity, his sincerity, his
inclusiveness, and above all his Faith and love of God. Fr. Peter loved being
a priest. He told me on more than one occasion that if he had to live his life
over again, he would still be a Priest. Of all the things he thought me, the
one thing that will always stay with me is to trust in the Lord. He thought
me that if you put your Trust in God, that there is no obstacle that one cannot
overcome.

I spoke to Fr. Peter the day I got back from Nigeria last September, he told
me he moved his trip to Nigeria from December to November, that his
brother’s health is failing and that he does not want to miss the opportunity
to tell Richard how grateful he was for all he did for the family.
He did not know that he would die before his brother Richard.
I had the privilege to spend a lot of time with Fr. Peter, in my home, in the
weeks before his trip to Nigeria. I spent more time with him his last few
weeks here than any other period of our friendship. I took him to the airport
on the 27th of October, I had taken him to and from the airport a number of
times before, for the first time, he handed me the keys to his home. He
asked me to take care of his home until he gets back, that all the bills were
paid, and to check his mail. We came through St. Jerome’s so that he could
take care of last minute stuff. On the way to the airport we talked about his
trip, what he planned to do when he gets there and what he would do when
he got back. I dropped him off at the airport, helped him with his luggage,
gave him a hug, and I told him to have a nice trip, and that I would see him
when he gets back. Little did I know that it would be the last time that I
would see him.

In retrospect, as I reflect on some of our conversations, I can now see that he
may have had a premonition, he may have felt that something major was
about to happen, but he did not know what and he did not know when.
I can see someone that was at peace with himself and had come to terms and
had resolved some personal issues that had bothered him for sometime.
The one incident that made Fr. Peter think seriously about his mortality
happened in 2001 when he suffered his first heart attack. A parishioner in
Zumbrota found him in time and he was airlifted to Mayo Clinic and
revived. His greatest fear since he lived alone was that he would die and his
body may not be discovered for sometime.

Fr. Peter was truly a man of God, I can only imagine that he is now resting
with the Lord. It was no coincidence that he had to move his trip back one month.
It was no coincidence that he was with his brother Richard during the last
hours of his life. His brother that he feared would die before he had a chance to thank him.
It was no coincidence that he got to be with his loved ones in the last days up
until his death. It was no coincidence that he said his last mass in his home Parish, a parish
that he started and is named in his honor. It was no coincidence that he was with another Priest and was able to say his last confession before he died. I will miss his company, his jokes and his sense of humor, his laughs, and above all, his advice.

May the soul of Fr. Peter Njoku, and the souls of all the faithful departed,
through the mercy of God, rest in Peace, Amen.

Joseph Nnebedum
Lake Elmo, Minnesota