Ossining, N.Y., June 22, 2026 ── Sister Euphrasia “Efu” Joseph Nyaki, M.M., a Maryknoll Sister of 35 years who changed lives as an optimistic and joyful leader in healing, died on May 30, 2026. She was 65.
Sr. Efu was born on Nov. 18, 1960, in Moshi, Tanzania, to Joseph Fredrick Nyaki and Maria Genesis Lyimo Kusare. The second of nine children, Sr. Efu is survived by five sisters — Chrisanta, Margaret, Gudila, Eliakunda and Rebecca — and one brother, Blass. She is predeceased by sisters Redempta and Lucy.
Sr. Efu graduated from Tambaza High School in Tanzania in 1984, with advanced certificates in math, physics and chemistry. She went on to earn her diploma in education at the Chang’ombe Teacher Training College in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, in 1986. She then taught at the Chanjale Seminary from 1987 to 1989. Sr. Efu entered the Maryknoll Sisters at Newburgh, N.Y., on Aug. 26, 1990, and pronounced first vows on Aug. 15, 1992. She pronounced final vows on May 15, 1999, in Joao Pessoa, Brazil.
In April 1993, Sr. Efu began her first assignment with the Brazil Mission Unit, where she collaborated with the Maryknoll Brazil Mission Community to support women’s groups in mental health, sexuality, human rights, domestic violence prevention and spirituality. She was active in the Catholic Church’s Afro-Brazilian pastoral ministry, and became a co-founder of Bamidele, the first Afro-Brazilian women’s non-governmental organization in the state of Paraiba.
In 2000, Sr. Efu co-founded the Afya Holistic Health Center for Women in the Alto do Mateus neighborhood of Joao Pessoa, Paraiba, alongside Sister Connie Pospisil and Brazilian advocate Maria de Lourdes Gomes. Afya offers alternative forms of preventative care and holistic healing, as well as training in family constellation, somatic experiencing and Reiki techniques. The Center recently celebrated its 25th anniversary and now welcomes people from all over the world, who travel to Brazil for trainings and healing.
Sr. Efu was called to Haiti in 2011, where she offered healing to help its people overcome the trauma of a catastrophic earthquake. She would return to Haiti annually along with Maryknoll Father Dennis Moorman, to train local leaders in trauma healing.
In recent years, Sr. Efu traveled the world teaching family constellation and Somatic Experiencing trauma healing in over 15 countries, and was a faculty member of the Hellinger Institute. In 2025, she launched her book, “Healing Trauma Through Family Constellations and Somatic Experiencing: Ancestral Wisdom from the Snail Clan of Tanzania in Portuguese.”
The Maryknoll Sisters would like to thank Sr. Efu for sharing her gifts with so many around the world and for her years of dedicated service to our One Earth Community.
A Mass of Resurrection was said for Sr. Efu on June 2, 2026, at the Mission Society of St. Columban in Seoul, Korea.