Peter LeJacq has lived a life dedicated to providing self-sustained healthcare infrastructure for Tanzania. He proves that great men don’t stop!
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“I want to be a doctor because I want to be a priest,”
With a population of 35 million, Tanzania has one doctor for every 40,000 people, as compared to one in 7000 in most African countries. Father LeJacq, along with other missioners of Maryknoll, The Weill Cornell Medical School, and an ever-growing network of donors, has become involved in an intercontinental effort to construct a self-sustained healthcare infrastructure for this African country.In accordance with the Tanzanian Government, The Catholic Bishops of Tanzania conceived and continue to direct this vision. One that will not only significantly upgrade the Bugando healthcare facility in Mwanza, Tanzania, but provide the country with only its fifth medical school. The Bugando Medical facility will better provide for the 10 million residents in its jurisdiction, and the Bugando University College of Health Science (BUCHS) will supply the doctors. In addition, Weill Cornell Medical College has taken the role of sister school to BUCHS. Its first 10 students will graduate this November 22nd, and graduating 50 annually is the school’s ambition.A serious goal and a serious man but that doesn’t mean LeJacq lacks a lighter side. Describing how faith merged with a calling to heal, he says,
“because I didn’t have the gift of healing, I wanted to do it the old fashioned way — by going to medical school.”
Long before completing 28 consecutive years of education, Father LeJacq says he was an ordinary Catholic growing up in Long Island but learning of missionary sister-doctors changed his mindset. Also impressed by the joy his parish priest expressed in serving others through God, Peter put together an eighth grade religion paper mapping out his future.
“Why I want to be a missionary priest-doctor in Africa,” remained a personal hope between Peter and the parish priest, because the priest felt the plans could be derailed by putting undue pressure on himself. Only years later, at Cornell, did Peter share them.
It didn’t come as a surprise to his family, but the same reaction certainly could not be expected from the student body at Cornell. “He’s a firmly determined person,” says former classmate Dr. Kevin Kelly, but his soft-spoken demeanor didn’t reveal his future plans. When word leaked out of the Dean’s office, Dr. Kelly wasn’t alone in assessing that Peter’s goals were “admirable but unrealistic.”
Although witnessing Peter navigate through adversity changed that consideration.
“I don’t ever remember seeing him ruffled. He seemed to take whatever came along carefree, calm and self assured,”
he says. Still, others worried of Peter’s pace without regard for himself. Heaven would provide ample time for himself, he allayed their concerns.
Regardless, Peter graduated from Cornell in 1981 and was ordained in 1987 — leaving him little time to question his choices. Occasionally, though, he thought of marriage or pursuing a medical career in the USA, but he never changed his schedule of studies.
These included assignments in Guatemala and Thailand but Africa never fell off Father LeJacq’s map. In 1984, his introduction to Africa came as a seminarian/doctor in training at a bush hospital in the Serengeti. Two years later, he found himself among about a dozen physicians at the Bugando referral hospital.
10 million under their care and delegating to doctors and nurses in training, triage took on an alarming meaning.
“You do what you can for those that you think you can help – for as long as you can stand,”
he says. Otherwise, it might seem that sleep could provide the only relief from his African experience.
Except becoming a doctor to become a priest had nothing to do with closing his eyes to suffering and everything to do with relief.
“If I did not believe they were going to God,” he says, “I don’t know that I would have been able to function for a dozen years in Tanzania pronouncing so many people dead.”
Being a U.S. citizen, though, did not leave him immune to the same medical hardships as Tanzanians. While none was life threatening, he contracted tuberculosis, hepatitis and had twelve bouts with malaria.
This provides one definition of Tanzanian poverty, but their daily struggle starts with whether water can be attained. After a bucket brigade to Lake Victoria or the nearest deep well pump, Tanzanians must secure a meal, and for those who can afford it, a dose of malaria prevention medicine.
Still, Tanzania has always kept the faith — except the African AIDS epidemic was never part of the equation. With his extensive experience in Africa, Father LeJacq became a consultant to Pope John Paul II in 1990 on AIDS related issues in East Africa.
He humbly suggested that the foundation of any AIDS policy called for the Pope to continue traveling the world encouraging the self-respect of materially poor people by assuring them that God’s love lives within all of us.
From his third world experience, LeJacq has found that people generally equate their poverty with a mindset leading them to believe that they lack the ability to make changes in their lifestyle. So it follows that,
“When someone like the Pope tells you that he believes in you and God’s spirit in you,” he says, “you may begin to believe in yourself and become better able to manage your life.”
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With 8% infected, the Tanzanian government advises abstinence, and makes condoms available to adults. While they don’t distribute condoms, the Tanzanian Catholic Church provides a large portion of the prevention and care programs.
In turn, the Tanzanian government respects the Church’s teaching about condom use for Catholics as a form of HIV prevention.
“Since condoms are not 100% effective in preventing the spread of any disease they have no place in a Catholic marriage, he says, “even when proposed as a method of disease prevention rather than as a known prohibited contraceptive.”
All in all, Father LeJacq returned to Ossining in 1996, taking pride in his part of the effort. Today, though, most of his thoughts are of the Tanzanian people.
Fortunately, in 1999, when the Tanzanian Bishops enacted their plans to build the medical school, it created an opportunity where his ruminations could have an impact. At the request of the Tanzanian Bishops, through Maryknoll, Father LeJacq took on a role that retroactively converted him from a missionary priest-doctor of Tanzania to a missionary priest-fundraiser for Tanzania.
Father LeJacq has helped raise money through family and friends, which includes the generosity of his old Alma Mater. When word made its way back to Cornell, they offered to provide the computers and CD-ROM curriculum to the students at BUCHS and initially provided the majority of the financial support.
With more than $20 million raised by the TOUCH Foundation since 2005, more than 2000 people count themselves part of this transatlantic endeavor. Among them, Mckinsey and Company, which is the largest consulting firm in the world, and serving as president of Touch is McKinsey director Lowell Bryan.
All of it aside, what might not be apparent is that, “He’s just a regular guy,” according to local friend Michael Mannix. Put aside the intellect and moral foundation and “You’ll find that going out to dinner with him is like going out with your college buddy,” he adds. A fortunate quality he possesses for the sake of Tanzania.
In fact, his illuminating personality makes Father LeJacq “the main event” when addressing potential donors, says Mr. Mannix. Although it’s a role Father LeJacq reluctantly takes according to Dr. Kelly. “He doesn’t really like publicity,” he says, but attention means donations for Tanzania. So in spite of it, Dr. Kelly adds,
“He swallows hard and goes with it because it’s the necessary cost of getting the project done.”
And with all he’s done for Tanzania, Father LeJacq also fills a void for Americans.
Find Rich Monetti on Facebook“He’s a Christian in action,” according to Mr. Mannix, “and a lot of people can’t do that because they’re doing the everyday activity of raising a family or working a job. So they turn to Peter and say, I can’t fulfill what you’re doing but at least I can give a helping hand.”
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