PHOTO: (L-R) Cllr. Tiawan S. Gongloe and the fallen Catholic Priest Monseigneur Robert Tikpor
By Tiawan Saye Gongloe
It is difficult to pay tribute to a man who contributed so much to his country and church. Where do I start from? I think it is better to start from the time that I came into contact with the legendary Catholic Priest for the first time. Sometime in 1966, I saw a man with a white garment standing across the road in the compound of the Late Alfred N. Johnson, the District Commissioner of Tappita, directly opposite the Late Francis Koso’s yard where I lived with my late uncle Gabriel G. Gongloe.
I thought he was an Islamic cleric. A few days later, I saw him giving clothes to children who were sitting on benches and listening to him. Eager to receive new clothing like the other children, I join the children the next day. It turned out that he was conducting a Catechism class. At the age of ten, all that I was interested in was the clothes and other gifts that followed the end of the class. What he was teaching seemed strange to me because my parents were Mid-Baptists and Uncle Gabriel was a devout Mid-Baptist and he was at the time the janitor of the Mid-Baptist Church located at Siaway Compound in Tappita. This was the beginning of the establishment of the Catholic Church for the first time in Lower Nimba County.
Eventually, in 1967, the great priest, then referred to as Father Tikpor, established the first Catholic Church in Tappita and the St. Francis Catholic School. In 1969, I enrolled at the St. Francis Elementary School as a fifth grader from Mehnla Public School, located in Mehnsonnoh Clan, Yarwin Mehnsonnoh County District, now Statutory District. Father thought us Catechism and the school ode, which begins with, “We are the boys of St. Francis of 1967…”. He encouraged students to read at all times without season. For example, on one occasion while I was visiting my classmate Christian Nyonton and conversing with him, Albert Karyue and others and apparently loud and disturbing him, Father, came out and shouted, “ Shut up you Gbogors, why don’t get something to read. I am reading and you people are out here making noise. Look whenever people come to visit me and you say “ Father sleeping, I am actually reading, not sleeping. Always find something to read and not just sit and talk.” When he left us we all complained, “Cheay, falla book business too hah oh” in Liberian English. But this was the tipical Monsigneur Tikpor. He wanted us to learn by following his example of reading without season.
He brought Bennio Ghan, now Bennio Blehsue, a very smart man, who had just completed the Fatima High School in Harper Maryland County as our fifth grade sponsor. In 1965, the name Bennio Blehsue was a household name in Tappita because, he did seven grade to tenth grade in one year based on double promotions. He was given a scholarship by the Catholic Church and sent to Fatima High School in Maryland. He thought us almost every subject from handwriting to Math, English, Science, Geography, History etc. Father, not long after, appointed him him the Principal of the School and relied on him so much for running the school. Both Father Tikpor and Mr. Ghan (Blehsue) were really dedicated to the full development of every child at St. Francis School in Tappita. We as students were subjected to rigid discipline for any misconduct both in the classroom and outside the classroom.
In 1970, he sent some girls from the St. Francis Elementary School to St. Mary’s High School to live on the Queen of Peace Convent. They included Annie Dennis, Roselyn Thomas, Frances Chea (now Frances Nayou) Scarlet Logan, amongst others. In 1971, he sent my sixth grade classmate, the Late Alexander Yancy, to Bishop Carol High School, having come first in the sixth grade National Exam for Lower Nimba County and given double promotion from sixth to eighth grade, given that the seventh grade was the highest class on St. Francis School at the time.
Father Tikpor was also a humanitarian. He helped some of the poor parishioners of the St. Francis Catholic Church to build their homes, gave them food and allowed their children to attend the school without paying tuition. He was truly a father for all. In my last meeting with him, his memory was failing and it was clear to me that his time was coming to an end. I owe him a lot for whatever society considers me to be today. Later, I enrolled at the St. Mary’s High School in Sanniquellie and met another priest so dedicated to the full development of the child, Father Micheal Kpakala Francis. I was very fortunate in life to have experienced the training of these two great Liberian Catholic priests. Monseigneur Tikpor, having now joined Arch-Bishop Francis, Bishop Juwle, Bishop Dalieh, Bishop Seekee and other older generation of Liberian Catholic Priests, may his soul and those of the faithful departed rest in perfect peace and may light perpetual shine on his soul.
Amen