Born March 10, 1936, at Villeneuve (Alberta), Donald (Don) Hugh MacDonald, was the youngest child of Angus and Laura Belle MacDonald. He outlived his oldest brother Mark (Lorraine), his two sisters, Jessie (Richard) and Mary (Dave), and brother Tony (Rose Marie).
On August 7, 1955, he entered the Franciscan novitiate in Sherbrooke (Quebec), where he learned French, his father’s second language. He made his solemn vows on August 30, 1959, and was ordained to the priesthood on August 14, 1960, in St Albert (Alberta).
After ordination, he taught for four years under the legendary Fr. Athol Murray at Notre Dame in Wilcox (Saskatchewan). In 1964 he left for Strasbourg (France), and doctoral studies in theology during the height of Vatican II, which shaped the thinking, faith, and compassion that marked his future ministry. In 1968, he was one of the few students to defend his thesis—in secret and in the Franciscan friary—during the height of the chaos of the May student uprisings that brought France to a standstill.
Returning home, in the fall of 1968, brother Don began teaching at St Joseph’s Seminary in Edmonton. When Newman Theological College was founded in 1969, at 33 he became head of its Systematic Theology Department.
For more than 50 years he taught and held various positions in the college, including Dean of Theology. He was President of the college three separate times and, because of his excellent judgment, found himself on the list of candidates for the episcopacy in western Canada.
In 1992, brother Don was elected Provincial of the Franciscans of Western Canada, a position he held for nine years. During that time, he continued to teach at Newman and to work steadily to develop closer relationships among Edmonton’s Christian churches, which resulted in Edmonton’s Anglican diocese naming him an honorary Canon. He retired from teaching in April 2020.
He died peacefully just before midnight December 12, 2024, at the Misericordia Hospital, in Edmonton (Alberta), at the age of 88, after 69 years of religious life and 64 years of priesthood.
