Fr. John J. Mudd, Executive Director for Advancement, Archbishop Carroll High School
Father John Mudd was born in Washington, D.C., July 2, 1943 and ordained a priest for the Archdiocese of Washington in 1969. His first assignment as a priest was at Our Lady Queen of Peace Church and School in Southeast, Washington. He attributes his early formation to the parishioners of Queen of Peace who he says, “taught me how to be a priest.”
He was appointed the Assistant Director of the Archdiocesan Office of Social Development in 1973. In this capacity Father Mudd developed educational materials and organized churches for involvement in urban and social justice issues.
In 1977 he was appointed Associate Pastor at Saint Augustine Church in Northwest, Washington. From 1980 to 1989 he was the Pastor of the Church. Saint Augustine is the oldest African American parish in the Archdiocese of Washington, and one of the first African American Catholic Churches in the Nation.
In his first 20 years as a priest in the Washington, Fr. Mudd watched as more that 15 Catholic secondary schools were closed, virtually all when they became predominantly African American. In 1990 he volunteered to begin a Development Office for the remaining African American Catholic high school, and the only one owned and operated by the Archdiocese.
From its modest beginnings — raising $108,000 that first year — Fr. Mudd has built a firm base of individual, corporate, and foundation support for Archbishop Carroll High School that contributes over 2.3 million dollars a year to operations, scholarship and tuition assistance.
Fr. Mudd retired from full-time active ministry in the Archdiocese of Washington in 2015, but continues to provide pastoral services for the Catholic Community at Fort Belvoir, and the Navy Yard, while assisting with funerals at Arlington National Cemetery. He still assists with fundraising at Archbishop Carroll High School on a volunteer basis.
