INTERIM EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR APPOINTED

Monsignor Antonicelli currently serves as the Pastor of St. Joseph’s on Capitol Hill and is the Episcopal Vicar for Canonical Services of the Archdiocese of Washington.

Monsignor Antonicelli was born in Jersey City, New Jersey in 1961. He attended Our Lady of Mercy Grammar School and Hudson Catholic High School in Jersey City before going to Boston College, where he received his bachelor’s degree in political science in 1983. He came to Washington to attend The Catholic University of America School of Law, where he earned his J.D. in 1986. He returned to New Jersey to practice law as Assistant Corporation Counsel of the City of Jersey City, and later in a private law firm before returning to Washington in 1988.

After discerning a call to the priesthood and being accepted as a seminarian for the Archdiocese of Washington in 1988, he attended the Pontifical North American College in Rome, where he received his bachelor’s and license degrees in sacred theology at the Pontifical University of St. Thomas Aquinas (Angelicum University). He was ordained a deacon in St. Peter’s Basilica on April 30, 1992. He completed his studies in 1993 and returned to Washington to be ordained a priest by Cardinal Hickey on June 26, 1993 at the Cathedral of St. Matthew the Apostle.

Msgr. Antonicelli was assigned as associate pastor at the Shrine of the Most Blessed Sacrament (1993-1996), and then at St. Andrew Apostle Parish (1996-1998), during which time he earned his license in canon law from The Catholic University of America. Cardinal Hickey asked him to return to Rome for doctoral studies in canon law in 1998. He returned to the Archdiocese in 1999 and was appointed Vice Chancellor.

In 2001, Msgr. Antonicelli became the priest secretary to Cardinal McCarrick. Msgr. Antonicelli was assigned to St. Joseph’s on Capitol Hill on September 21, 2002 as parochial vicar and was named administrator on March 21, 2003. Cardinal McCarrick named him pastor on November 1, 2003. He was appointed Episcopal Vicar for Canonical Services of the Archdiocese of Washington in 2008.