For 50 years, Father Bou’s passion has been focusing on others’ needs

Becoming a priest in the Society of the Divine Word community has been a good fit for Father Pedro L. Bou, parochial vicar of Our Lady of Guadalupe Parish, Lakewood.

He’s found it to be a community that has fulfilled his lifelong desire to serve as a missionary and to help people in need by making their lives easier.

PHOTO GALLERY: Father Bou retires

What Father Bou didn’t expect is that he would not have to travel far to be a missionary. In his 50 years of priesthood, he found that there was work to be done right where he was.

“When I looked around, I thought we have a mission right here in the U.S., and I can help our Latino community,” he said. And that’s been the focal point of many of his 50 years of priesthood – 48 in the Diocese of Trenton, where he has established parish communities and helped people grow closer to their faith.

Addressing Challenges

Father Bou was born in Puerto Rico in 1945 to Fransisco Bou and Nicomedes Cosme. He was nine years old when his family relocated to Chicago. It was there that he gained great awareness and empathy for the immigrant population and the challenges and difficulties they faced in assimilating to a new culture.

Father Bou attended public schools, graduating in 1965. He recalled that the course he took in Latin sparked curiosity among his friends. When asked why he took Latin, Pedro, who was young and embarrassed, told his friends that he wanted to be a doctor. Little did they know that Pedro was actually discerning a call to priesthood.Divine Word Father Pedro Bou leads a Eucharistic procession with the Blessed Sacrament for the Solemnity of the Most Holy Body and Blood of Jesus June 2. Vic Mistretta photo

“Until I got enough courage to publish in the yearbook that I wanted to be a priest,” he kept saying he wanted to be a doctor, Father Bou said.

Father Bou’s taste for ministry started at age 14, when he began volunteering in his parish and developed a deeper connection and growing love for his Catholic faith. He recalled the youth minister, Diane Thyer, who “always noticed that I was a little different … that I was more spiritual than the other guys. … She suggested that I should look into priesthood, and I really liked the idea.”

The Society of the Divine Word and its work with humble and poor people appealed to Father Bou. “So, I reached out to them,” he said, noting that, at the time, it was the beginning of spring and by September, he was in the seminary.

His schooling included Divine Word Seminary, Miramar, Mass.; Divine Word College, Epworth, Iowa, where he earned a bachelor’s degree in sociology, and Catholic Theological Union in Chicago. He was ordained in 1974 at the community’s Chicago province in Techny, Ill.

Father Bou arrived in New Jersey in 1976 and was assigned to St. Peter Claver Parish, Asbury Park, a culturally diverse community, where he set out to learn new ways to engage with the parishioners and be of service to them.

His next assignment was as the founding pastor of Our Lady of Providence Parish, Neptune, in 1981, to minister to the area’s growing Hispanic community, and after that he was transferred to St. Anthony Claret, a Hispanic parish in Lakewood. After serving several assignments in other parts of the Diocese, Father Bou returned to St. Anthony Claret Parish in 2005 as pastor and remained there until he stepped down as pastor but continued as parochial vicar, his current assignment.

Meeting The Needs

“There are many people out here that are hurting, and I like to bring people to their faith,” Father Bou said, noting that he believes there are many people who experience sadness, estrangement or seem lost simply because they lack sufficient knowledge about their faith.

“God is inviting us to be one with him to have a relationship with him,” he said, and one way for people to grow in their faith is through formation programs.

Father Bou said he has been most fulfilled as a priest when he has been able help to “resolve difficulties that people are facing,” whether it’s helping to establish a parish community, participating in something fun such as a “dunk tank” to raise funds for a special need, or fostering a deeper love for faith among the community.

Father Bou plans to retire to his community’s motherhouse in Techny but emphasizes that his heart remains dedicated to serving others.

“I still have so much energy to give,” he said.

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