Five Christendom alumni will be ordained as priests this summer, raising the total number of Christendom alumni priests to 109. Deacons Matthew Kane ’17 and Joseph Duffy ’19 will both be ordained priests for the Priestly Fraternity of St. Peter, while Deacon Paul Kucharski ’01 will be ordained a priest for the Archdiocese of New York. In addition, Deacon Philip Gilbert ’15 will be ordained a priest of the Ukrainian Greek-Catholic Church and Deacon Nate Tapsak ’19 will be ordained a priest of the Byzantine Catholic Church.
Deacons Kane and Duffy will be ordained on May 29th at Our Lady of Guadalupe Seminary in Nebraska. Once ordained, they will raise the total number of FSSP alumni ordinations to 10, joining Fr. Joseph Portzer, Fr. Chris Pelster, Fr. Gerard Saguto, Fr. Daniel Heenan, Fr. Zach Akers, Fr. John Killackey, Fr. David McWhirter, and Fr. Joseph Dalimata as priests, with several other alumni studying in their seminary for the priesthood.
Deacon Paul Kucharski ’01.
Deacon Kucharski will be ordained at St. Patrick’s Cathedral on Saturday, May 25. After graduating from Christendom in 2001, Deacon Kucharski moved to New York City to begin graduate studies in philosophy at Fordham University. After earning his doctorate, he taught philosophy at Manhattanville College in Purchase, New York, for nearly 10 years. During this time, he taught a variety of courses in ethics and the history of philosophy. He also co-edited The McCabe Reader and authored a number of articles and book reviews in various academic journals. In 2018, Paul began to discern the possibility of a priestly vocation and in 2019 was accepted as a seminarian for the Archdiocese of New York, being ordained a transitional deacon last year.
Deacon Philip Gilbert ’15.
Deacon Gilbert will be ordained on Saturday, May 25, at Holy Transfiguration Monastery in California. After graduating from Christendom, Deacon Gilbert earned his Master’s of Divinity from the Catholic University of America in 2018 and his Master’s in theology from the Ukrainian Catholic University in 2020. He was ordained to the subdiaconate in 2018, later being ordained a deacon as well.
Deacon Nate Tapsak ’19.
Deacon Tapsak, meanwhile, will be ordained on June 2. Following his time at Christendom, Deacon Tapsak studied Russian, Slavic, and Eastern European Studies at the University of Pittsburgh, later teaching English at a high school in Slovakia for a year. He began his studies at the Byzantine Catholic Seminary immediately after, graduating Summa Cum Laude with his Master’s of Divinity this past May.
In 45+ years, Christendom has been blessed to see many religious vocations amongst its alumni. While Christendom was founded to help form lay people who would then impact every area of society, the college’s faithful Catholic liberal arts education has helped many alumni discover a religious vocation while they are students. In total, Christendom currently has 104 priests, 53 sisters, 5 brothers, 3 transitional deacons, 1 permanent deacon, 2 consecrated virgins and 11 men currently studying for the priesthood. 579 alumna-to-alumnus marriages.