IN MEMORIAM

From the Ateneo Alumni Office:

Math teacher’s teacher, Fr. Prudencio F. Macayan, S.J., 84

Fr. Prudencio F. Macayan, S.J., who taught mathematics at the Ateneo de Manila University High School for 33 years, passed away at the Jesuit Residence on 8 May 2005, at the age of 84.

Father Mac, as he was fondly called by his students, was born in Ballay, Bauang, La Union and finished his elementary schooling at Naguilian Elementary School, also in the same province. He went to Baguio City High School for his secondary education and then studied at Mapua Institute of Technology, in Intramuros, Manila until the war broke out in 1941.

He entered the Sacred Heart Novitiate in Novaliches, Quezon City on 26 April 1944 and continued his Jesuit formation there until 1951.

During his regency from 1951-1954, Father Mac taught religion, English, Latin and mathematics at the Ateneo de Cagayan High School in Cagayan de Oro City.

From 1954-1958, he attended Woodstock College in Woodstock, Maryland, where he completed his Bachelor of Sacred Theology degree. He was ordained on 22 June 1957 by Francis Cardinal Spellman at the Fordham University Chapel, and took his final vows at the Ateneo de San Pablo in San Pablo City on 15 August 1960.

Father Mac was first assigned to the Ateneo de San Pablo as Prefect of Discipline and mathematics teacher from 1959-1966. After San Pablo, he began his long and memorable stint with the Ateneo de Manila University High School, where he taught mathematics from 1966-1999, and served as assistant to the Physical Plant Supervisor from 1999-2003.

His countless students remember him as an exacting tutor who taught them not only competence and ease with numbers, but strength and refinement of character as well. To them, he exemplified a life of “simplicity and truth” and they observed that, through the decades, “he took on life more fully, and growing old, as a moment laden with grace.”

He spent the last two years of his life mostly in the infirmary, consoled by the companionship and prayers of friends and of brothers in the Society, until his death on Sunday, 8 May 2005.

His remains lie in state at the Ateneo de Manila High School chapel, Loyola Heights, Quezon City. There will be a mass every night at 8:00 P.M. Interment will be on Thursday, 12 May, at the Sacred Heart Novitiate, Novaliches, Quezon City after the 8:00 A.M. funeral mass at the Church of the Gesù, Ateneo de Manila University, Loyola Heights, Quezon City.

Notes of condolence may be sent to his sisters: Mrs. Virginia Canivel (951 Dogwood Drive, South Slocan, British Columbia, Canada VOG 2GO) and Mrs. Filomena M. Andres (511 Q-M Subdivision, 2600 Baguio City).