March 2, 2011

A Mass of Christian Burial for Marianist Father Cyril Middendorf will be celebrated March 5 in Queen of Apostles Chapel at Mount St. John in Dayton. Father Middendorf, 87, died Feb. 19.

A native of Bromley, Ky., Father Middendorf graduated from the University of Dayton in 1944. He professed his first vows in 1942 and his perpetual vows as a Marianist in 1945. He was ordained on July 12, 1953.

In the Archdiocese of Cincinnati he taught at the former Purcell High School and Archbishop Moeller High School before serving as associate pastor at Emmanuel Parish from 1963-65. He also held teaching assignments in Cleveland, Philadelphia and Brooklyn, N.Y. He worked at the University of Dayton as a chaplain from 1965 to 1978 and is credited with starting many of the campus service organizations that were precursors to the university’s current Center for Social Concern.

After leaving the university, Father Middendorf was a chaplain at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base for nearly 20 years. He retired from active ministry in 2003 to the Marianist community at Mercy Siena in Dayton.

Father Middendorf is survived by his brother, Gerald, and sisters, Dorothy Byrne, Jean Doellman, Donna McMurrer, Paula Wood and Sister of Notre Dame Juliane Middendorf. Interment was in Queen of Heaven Cemetery at Mount St. John.