ALUMNI

The ’10s

Class Notes

Will Ryan, ’11 is the author of a weekly column, “Understanding Nonsense,” on Cystic Fibrosis News Today, an online community for people living with CF. Will’s essays have included “What Jesuit Education Taught Me While I Was Hospitalized,” a reflection on a hospital visit from Fr. Tony Azzarto, S.J. when Will was a freshman at Prep.

Stephen Makino, ’19, currently attending Villanova University, was one of 20 students nationwide awarded a Visiones Scholarship by the nonprofit organization INROADS last October. Stephen was recognized for the way “he demonstrated his leadership, how he was able to pivot during the pandemic, and showed his plans to address the diversity issues in his community.”

Jack Raslowsky, ’79, Mario Duque, ’87, Jose Fajardo, ’87, and Paul Lagermasini, ’87 gathered for dinner in December when Mario was back in New York. Mario currently lives in Colombia, where he practices as a chiropractor. We’ll forgive Jack’s Xavier vest; he is, after all, their president.

Former Prep faculty member Greg Morrisey, ’08 led a Prep group— Ryan Byington ’23, Ryan Cotter ’22, Patrick Groo ’22, Patrick Rooney ’21, Will Byington ’21, Lucas Coleman ’17, and Andrew Alfonso ’17—to the summit of Mount Kilimanjaro last summer. Greg credited Billy Bludgus, ’01 and his “wealth of knowledge of Tanzania” for helping “to get this trip afloat.”

Jim Sweeney, ’71, a former trustee, and Bob Urbanovich, ’78 were on hand in Dubai for the wedding of Kyle Lupo, ’13 and Aneesha Kulkarni in January. Kyle and Aneesha met at Purdue University while pursuing their Ph.D.s in Pharmacology. If you’re wondering how this alumni gathering took shape a mere 6,800 miles from Grand & Warren, Bob is a friend of the Lupo family, and Jim is the father-in-law of Kyle’s brother (and best man), Bill Lupo.

Before Edgar Santa Cruz, ’98 passed away suddenly in December, he had been working as Community Farm Manager at Foodlink, a nonprofit fighting hunger in Rochester, NY. He had previously served the Rochester community as a social worker. A colleague from Foodlink wrote, “his work was ultimately about building relationships, and supporting and advocating for others. He did this so very well, and his loss will undoubtedly be felt by the community that he has served for many years.” Cameron Community Ministries—where Edgar had previously worked, and continued to serve as a volunteer—plans to rename its Peace Garden in his memory. It’s clear from the response to his passing among the Rochester community that Edgar was a true Prep man for others.

The new Saint Peter statue dedicated on Warren Street in September (page 12) is a rarity among art depicting Prep’s patron, in that it captures Peter (at this point in his life, still known as Simon) in his younger days as a fisherman, rather than as the elder statesman of the early Church. But this depiction, while uncommon, is not unprecedented in the history of Prep’s campus. The final iteration of Saint Peter’s Church, Jersey City’s oldest parish and the direct namesake of Saint Peter’s Prep and Saint Peter’s University, opened at Grand and Van Vorst Streets in 1960. The low-slung brick building was designed to be relatively lightweight, as the high water table at this location had quite literally sunk the previous church, built in 1867, forcing its demolition for safety reasons. While somewhat nondescript from the outside, the 1960 church featured its share of distinctive modern liturgical art inside, from the colorful stained glass windows that contrasted with the moody interior lighting, to a backlit glass altarpiece of the risen Christ, to the stained glass Stations of the Cross that adorned the side walls. And in the lobby off Van Vorst Street, a high-relief metal sculpture depicted Simon Peter the fisherman, accompanied by the legend “HENCEFORTH YOU SHALL CATCH MEN,” recalling Jesus’ words to his first apostle on the lakeshore.

The Archdiocese of Newark closed Saint Peter’s Church in 2009 along with several other Jersey City parishes. Prep, which had purchased the church building from the Archdiocese in 2006, converted the now-deconsecrated space into O’Keefe Commons in 2010, allowing the former Burke Hall cafeteria to become the main lobby and first-floor labs of the Moriarty Science Center in 2011. The sculpture of Peter was placed in storage, but flooding from Hurricane Sandy damaged it beyond repair in 2012. It is immortalized in these photos by Mark Wyville, ’76, P’11, and, through the work of Brian Hanlon in creating the new statue at York and Warren Streets, its legacy lives on, more prominently than ever.