IF THE national hero Jose Rizal were alive today, he would probably drop in and light a candle here on the ?day of the dead? in homage to his teachers.
In these condominium-style tombs set around a quadrangle no bigger than a basketball court lie some of the revered educators, scholars, writers, artists and scientists who guided Filipinos on that rare path where spiritual growth and intellectual pursuits meet.
The country?s main Jesuit cemetery, the final resting place for many members of the Society of Jesus serving in the Philippines, is located in a tree-canopied compound of the Sacred Heart Novitiate in Novaliches, Quezon City.
The cemetery was built with the establishment of the novitiate in 1933. Jesuit communities in the provinces have similar burial grounds.
3 generations of Jesuits
The one at the novitiate is said to hold the remains of three ?generations? of Jesuits?Spanish, American and Filipino members of the religious order founded by St. Ignatius Loyola in the 16th century?many of whom have left great legacies and have streets, parks and buildings named in their honor.
Yet their graves reflect none of that loftiness. No oversized crosses or statuary, or profound epitaphs. Not one gilded headstone or polished marble slab.
Each tomb simply states the dates of birth and death of the deceased?and also the day he entered the order. The inscriptions are either written with ordinary house paint or, for the older graves, etched on the stone.
The unadorned niches are stacked three- to four-levels high, around an empty lawn. From the gate, one can see the entire square all at once, no one grave attracting special attention.
Just outside the enclosure, towering trees serenely stand guard and cool the stones beneath their overarching boughs.
?This is not a sad place but a place of love, hope and admiration,? said renowned Jesuit theologian Fr. Catalino Arevalo, SJ.
Great men
?It?s not sad because we know that these people had served the Lord and that they are now with him. And that someday we?ll meet again,? said Arevalo, 84, professor emeritus of the Loyola School of Theology at the Ateneo de Manila University.
Arevalo, who served as a spiritual adviser to the late President Corazon Aquino, said he must be old enough to have personally known ?80 percent of those buried there. My whole Ateneo family is there.?
According to a partial list prepared by Arevalo, the cemetery holds the remains of the following ?great men?:
Most Rev. Vincent Kennally?Superior of the Cagayan-Bukidnon mission and novice master of Sacred Heart before World War II, he was incarcerated by the Japanese at Fort Santiago during World War II. He later served in the Caroline and Marshall islands and returned to the Philippines ?just to die here.?
Fr. John Pollock?Beloved missionary priest in Mindanao who was made honorary citizen of Camiguin. In his later years, he was reputed to have heard confessions for 10 to 12 hours a day that long lines formed outside his room.
Fr. Eduardo Hontiveros?Recognized ?Father of Filipino sacred songs and liturgical music? who composed some 400 pieces sung to this day.
Fr. George Willmann?Founder of the Knights of Columbus in the Philippines.
Fr. John Patrick Delaney?Renowned teacher who has a plaza and a hall named in his honor at the Ateneo and University of the Philippines campuses, respectively; his funeral march from Diliman to Novaliches was the ?longest? ever witnessed by Filipinos of his time, on par with that of President Ramon Magsaysay.
Fr. Joseph Mulry?An inspiring teacher of literature and philosophy, he pioneered in directing Ateneans to be concerned with social justice and the working man. He was known for his sense of humor and love of words.
Fr. Horacio de la Costa?If Rizal was the outstanding Atenean in history during the 19th century, it was De la Costa for the 20th, according to Arevalo.
?A truly great Filipino with a mind of great profundity, clarity and talent for writing,? said Arevalo of De la Costa, the first Filipino Jesuit to obtain an outstanding doctorate in history from Harvard. Various sites on the Ateneo campus and a street in the Makati business district have been named for him.
Fr. Joaquin Vilallonga?Nationalist Sen. Claro M. Recto considered Vilallonga the major influence on him as a student and admired the man all his life.
Fr. Miguel Selga?Greatly regarded internationally for his research at the Manila Observatory and his expertise on typhoons. He destroyed his volumes of notes fearing the Japanese would take them during the war.
Archbishop Luis del Rosario?A brilliant expert on canon law. He was the first Filipino Jesuit to be made bishop and later became Archbishop of Zamboanga. He was active in the Second Vatican Council, the ecumenical council convoked by Pope John XXIII which reformed the liturgy and established an atmosphere where progressive church members could freely express their views.
Fr. Henry Lee Irwin?Drama teacher and director who was the moving force behind the Ateneo Theater and its famed productions. The campus theater is now named after him.
Fr. Jose Arguelles Cruz?A grandnephew of Rizal, this philosophy teacher served as president of the Ateneo during the Marcos years. With a gift for friendship, he became a ?go-between? between the regime and the Jesuits.
Tombs of the unknown
Like a military memorial park, the Jesuit cemetery also has its version of ?The Tomb of the Unknown Soldier.?
Two neighboring niches contain the bones of 87 Jesuits who died in Manila in the period before the war, dating back to the 1800s.
Both tombs bear the inscription: ?Unknown to men but known to God? (from the Latin, Ignoti hominibus noti Deo).
According to Fr. Miguel Bernad, SJ, it may be a misnomer to call them tombs of ?unknown? priests since the bones were originally from the Church of San Ignacio in Intramuros, where the dead Jesuits had their marked crypts.
When the church was destroyed and the bones scattered during the war, a ?drastic decision? was made to put the bones together in boxes without identification and rebury them in Novaliches, Bernad has written.
Among the bones, Bernad said, would be those of the following:
Fr. Jose Fernandez Cuevas?Superior of the first group of Jesuits who returned to the Philippines in 1859, a century after the order was expelled from the islands by the Spanish king.
Fr. Jose Ignacio Guerrico?One of the founders of the Jesuit mission in what is now Cotabato, he wrote long letters urging a more sympathetic attitude toward Muslims. He later served as confessor to the students when Rizal was at the Ateneo. Rizal sculpted a bust of Guerrico during the former?s exile in Dapitan.
Fr. Mateo Gisbert?One of the pioneers in the Christianization of Davao and a member of the first expedition to reach the summit of Mt. Apo, the country?s highest peak.
Fr. Francisco de Paula Sanchez?Rizal?s favorite teacher who encouraged his literary interests and molded his writing style.
Padre Faura
There is another famed Jesuit who died while serving in Manila but whose bones were not transferred to Novaliches. The bones of Fr. Federico Faura, after whom the Ermita street is named, were brought to be buried in his hometown in Spain.
Though not the founder of the Manila Observatory, Faura was the first to win international recognition for the facility, according to Bernad.
Faura and Rizal had a ?mutual respect and admiration for each other.? Bernad writes that it was Faura who prophetically said that Rizal would ?die on the scaffold.? The remark then was just his friendly way of warning Rizal to be careful.
There is purpose in having the cemetery within the novitiate, a secluded place where Jesuit novices spend their first two years in self-reflection and prayer.
Womb to tomb
?It is here where some of us are formed and hope to come back when our work is done. There?s that concept of ?womb to tomb,? of going full circle, a romantic way of looking at our work,? said Rev. Alberto Paurom, a medical doctor who had his formation at Sacred Heart from 2000 to 2002.
?Here the novices can express their gratitude, reawaken their hope, and talk to (the departed Jesuits) like living friends, for they really are still alive in God,? said Arevalo.
