10 November 2009
This appointment was made by the Sulpician Fathers with the approval of the Most Reverend George H. Niederauer, D.D., Ph.D., Archbishop of San Francisco and Chancellor of St. Patrick’s.
Father McKearney, 47, was ordained a priest for the Archdiocese of Hartford in 1997 and he became a Sulpician in 2001. An alumnus of Western Connecticut University in Danbury, Connecticut, and St. Mary’s Seminary & University in Baltimore, Maryland, Fr. McKearney holds an S.T.D. from the Pontifical Gregorian University in Rome. He first joined the faculty of St. Patrick’s in 1999 and was appointed Vice-Rector in 2007. In addition, Fr. McKearney has been the Director of Music and Dean of Students at St. Patrick’s and has taught homiletics for many years.
The new Leadership Team at St. Patrick’s, led by Fr. McKearney includes Fr. Gladstone Stevens, Vice Rector/Academic Dean, Fr. James Myers, Vice President for Administration/Director of Vatican II Institute, Fr. Vincent Bui, Dean of Students. and Jennifer Morris, Director of Business and Finance.
Father McKearney replaced the Reverend Gerald L. Brown, S.S., Ph.D., who had been President/Rector of St. Patrick’s since 2004.
Founded in 1641 in Paris, the Society of St. Sulpice is a community of diocesan priests dedicated to the formation and education for the Catholic priesthood as well as providing programs for the continuing formation of priests.