By UCA News Reporter
Catholics on Indonesia’s eastern island of Lembata have paid tribute to an American priest who spent six decades serving the islanders and empowering generations of Catholics with pastoral activism.
Divine Word missionary Father Nicholas Strawn, popularly known as Father Niko, died at Bukit Lewoleba Hospital in Lembata, East Nusa Tenggara province, on Aug 4. He was 92.
He arrived in Indonesia in 1963 at the age of 29. He has been mostly based in the Diocese of Larantuka in East Nusa Tenggara, serving Catholic parishes of Sacred Heart in Lerek and St Joseph in Boto.
According to the Divine Word congregation, Father Strawn’s demise marks the end of an era in the history of the island where foreign missionaries preached Catholicism and nurtured faith for decades.
“We remember him as a priest who was very close to the people, willing to visit remote areas and greet us warmly, while reminding us to study well,” Anselmus Deri, a Catholic and journalist from Lembata, told UCA News.
Deri recalled that after Mass, Father Strawn often invited young people to the rectory and told them stories from international magazines so they could learn about the wider world.
“I later realized that such experience helped shape our decision to become writers and journalists,” Deri said, adding that dozens of writers and journalists like him came from his St Joseph in Boto.
He said some students who could not afford school fees sometimes borrowed money from the priest.
“They later repaid him with pork, venison or chicken,” Deri said.
Deri said Father Strawn’s witness also helped foster priestly vocations. Sacred Heart Parish in Lerek, where the missionary served for 24 years, now has about 50 priests, including retired Franciscan Bishop Leo Laba Ladjar of Jayapura, and dozens of nuns.
Justin Wejak, a Catholic researcher and ethnographer from Lembata who lives in Melbourne, Australia, said he first met Father Strawn in the 1970s when the priest visited Lewokukung station in Kalikasa Parish to celebrate monthly Mass.
He came to know the missionary more closely at San Dominggo Seminary in Hokeng in the early 1980s, where he remembered him as a priest who encouraged students to study hard and pray.
Wejak said many Lembata Catholics remembered Father Strawn for his constant smile, simple manner and ability to make people feel close to the Church.
Father Strawn was born on Sep 24, 1934, in Oelwein, Iowa, in the United States.
He began serving in Sacred Heart Parish in Lerek in February 1964 and later moved to St Joseph Parish in Boto in 1987.
Lembata is part of the Diocese of Larantuka, which covers the East Flores and Lembata regencies as well as the islands of Adonara and Solor.
As of 2023, the diocese had about 226,821 Catholics out of a total population of 277,505, according to official Church data. – UCA News
