 Fr. Antoninus Hall, OP
When Fr. Antoninus Hall died at the untimely age of 53 just days before the convening of
the XVII Provincial Chapter, our Province lost a gifted intellect, a devoted scholar and a
delightful personality.
Born of Protestant stock in Placentia, California, on November
18, 1927, the youngest of five siblings, Fr. Hall was raised on an orange ranch near
Fullerton. He graduated from Fullerton High
School and enrolled at St. Mary’s College in Moraga where he was the roommate of the
young student, John (later Fr. Hilary) Martin. At
St. Mary’s, he was drawn to the faith and requested instruction, and was received
into the Church by the college chaplain, Fr. Moss with John Martin as his godfather. Joining the Army after his second year of college,
he spent some time in Tokyo, where he decided to apply to the Order.
Upon his return to the States, he attended St. Martin’s Abbey College in Lacey,
Washington, as a postulant for the Province. He
entered the Order at Kentfield on August 10, 1951, and made his profession on August 28 of
the following year. As a philosophy student at
St. Albert’s, Br. Antoninus demonstrated a
remarkable facility for speculative thought and a creative ability in artistic design. A natural clown, he delighted his brothers with his
antics and genuine good humor. Volunteering to
be an exchange student with the Province of Germany, Antoninus was sent, after solemn
profession, to the studium at Walberberg, a house he would remember with great fondness
for the remainder of his life. To this day, he
is recalled as a chief protagonist in what our German confreres have come to call the
“American Legend” at Walberberg. It
was there that Antoninus came to develop an affinity with things Spanish, and he
cultivated the friendship and esteem of the Spanish students who were doing their
philosophy at the German studium. Together
with his classmate, Fr. Albert Gerald Buckley, and with 10 German brethren and 12 diocesan
seminarians, Fr. Hall was ordained a priest amidst the splendors of Cologne Cathedral on
July 25, 1957 (significantly the feast of Santiago, patron of Spain) by the late Cardinal
Josef Frings.
Thereafter, Fr. Hall transferred to the Angelicum in Rome, where he completed his
studies and earned a licentiate. While in
Rome, his health was not robust and he began to develop symptoms of the diabetes which
would eventually prove fatal.
Upon his return to the Province in 1959, Fr. Hall joined the community of St. Peter
Martyr Priory in Los Angeles and taught theology at Mount St. Mary’s College. Three
years later, he was assigned to St. Albert’s and taught at his alma mater, St.
Mary’s College. During this period he
developed a keen interest in translating the works of the late Spanish theologian Fr.
Marin-Sola. Having obtained the proper
contracts, he gave over a great deal of his time to this task. One remembers him sipping at his mug of hot black
tea as he pored over the manuscripts on his desk.
The clown in him, nevertheless, lived on. The
venerable corridors at St. Albert’s would reverberate every afternoon as he roared
with laughter over his favorite T.V. program, “McHale’s Navy.” When the Berkeley Priory project was launched, Fr.
Hall was numbered among the charter members. But
feeling that he could better carry out his translating work in Spain, he obtained
permission to transfer to Oviedo, where he spent the years remaining to him in serious
scholarship and in delighting young Spaniards with the intricacies of the English
language.
Nothing, however, could stop the progress of his old illness. The Lord called this man of great faith and merry
humor to Himself, rather unexpectedly, at our convent in Salamanca on June 16, 1981. His remains were returned to the Province, and after
a Funeral Mass in St. Albert’s chapel, he rests among our brothers in Benicia.
--Fr. Albert Buckley, 0.P. |
