Some older readers of Update will remember the late Fr. William J. Lee, PSS, who served as President of St. Mary’s Seminary & University from 1972 to 1980. During his tenure, Fr. Lee worked closely with his younger colleague Fr. Frederick J. Cwiekowski, PSS, who served as rector of St. Mary’s in Roland Park, Maryland, from 1974 to 1977. When Fr. Lee died on February 19, 2012, he left a sizeable legacy to St. Mary’s with the intention that it would lead eventually to the establishment of a faculty chair in honor of Fr. Cwiekowski.
In August 2026, Fr. Cwiekowski will celebrate his ninetieth birthday, and so some of his former students who became Sulpicians decided to fulfill Fr. Lee’s wish, and, with an additional donation from the Sulpician community, St. Mary’s established the Fr. Frederick Cwiekowski Chair in Systematic Theology. The Chair was announced on February 7, and first professor to hold it will be named this coming summer.
An alumnus of St. Mary’s, Fr. Cwiekowski was ordained a priest of the Archdiocese of Hartford, Connecticut, in 1962 and became a Sulpician two years later. After an initial seminary assignment and the completion of an MA in philosophy at the University of Notre Dame, he was assigned to further graduate studies at the University of Louvain where he earned the STD in 1972. His primary area of interest was ecclesiology, and his doctoral thesis was published by Louvain University Press in 1971 under the title, The English Bishops and the First Vatican Council.
In 1966, while completing his doctoral thesis, Fr. Cwiekowski joined the faculty at St. Mary’s in Roland Park, where he taught systematic theology, served as a spiritual director, and later was rector for three challenging years in the wake of Vatican II.
As a professor, he was highly energetic, always well prepared, and demanding. One of his former students, Thomas Hurst, PSS, said “I found his enthusiasm for theology inspiring and contagious. His courses laid a solid foundation for further study, reflection, and prayer.” Many of his former students can testify that they learned a lot in his classes. He gave good example of careful scholarship, loyalty to Catholic teaching, and intellectual balance. He was also highly regarded as a spiritual director and preacher, and, like his mentor Fr. Lee, he had a deep commitment to social justice.
After 25 years at St. Mary’s, in 1991 Fr. Cwiekowski was transferred to St. Patrick’s Seminary in Menlo Park, California, where he continued to teach systematic theology and served as a formator. While there he wrote a second book on ecclesiology titled The Beginnings of the Church, published by Paulist Press in 1987.
After his retirement in 2009, he assisted part-time at St. Patrick’s until 2014 when he moved to Catonsville, Maryland. Since then, he has assisted at local parishes and continued his theological research and writing.
In 2018, Liturgical Press published his third book, titled The Church: Theology in History.
For his many contributions to priestly formation, especially through his teaching and scholarship, the U.S. Province of the Sulpicians thanks Fr. Cwiekowski and congratulates him on the establishment of the Fr. Frederick Cwiekowski Chair in Systematic Theology.
Thomas R. Ulshafer, PSS