The Bishop's Weekly Column from the Parish Bulletin

OUR LADY OF FATIMA

CATHOLIC CHURCH

Father John Peek R.I.P.

September 8th, 2009

Fr. Peek (almost center looking towards the camera) myself
to the right all vested in cassock immediately prior to our tonsure
I was trying not to laugh at the moment - we all looked so funny in black for the first time

One of my columns a couple of years ago was guest-written by the late Fr. John Peek. A parishioner who spends his summers (sometimes) near his native Boston used to attend the chapel serviced by Fr. Peek and shared a bulletin with me that had an interesting article on the error of sedevacantism. I like it so much I posted it here. Fr. read the column and e-mailed me thanking me for posting it here. I was glad to touch base with him since we entered the seminary together. Although he was 40 (I believe) when he entered I always found him a likeable fellow. He was a convert to Catholicism like myself.

Yesterday I learnt that Fr. had passed away. I know he had been in poor health and if memory serves he needed dialysis treatments as well.

He was a quiet soul, a little erratic, well meaning and very kind. Unlike myself, he was a very placid person as I recall. I had quite a bit of dealing with him "professionally" in the seminary, I was library prefect and he the prefect of the bookstore. Too many copies were often transferred by me to him for sale either to seminarians or the lay faithful.

Although ordained for the Society of St. Pius X, he left them in the late 1990s, hung around with the Fraternity of St. Peter (off and on) was the Pastor of Fr. John Keane's chapel of St. Roger and St. Mary in Boston and finally returned to the SSPX in the last couple of years. He died, reportedly, in Dickinson, Texas, where Queen of Angels chapel is a major SSPX hub.

Newly tonsured and enrobed in the surplice Fr. Peek 2nd row last on the right
Myself looking very pensive front row 2nd from the left.
18 years ago ! Where are they now ? Some made it... others didn't.
As Bishop Williamson was fond of saying: "They look like good seminarians !"

+TF