Kevin Francis Dwyer, O.S.A.

1936 – 2025 (August 23)

Kevin Francis Dwyer, O.S.A., was born on April 18, 1936, in Boston, Massachusetts, the son of Francis L. and Helen R. (Donovan) Dwyer. He had two sisters. He was baptized on May 3, 1936, at Saint Augustine Catholic Church, (Tower Hill), Lawrence, Massachusetts. He attended Saint Augustine Parish School, Lawrence, Massachusetts from 1941 to 1949, and Saint John’s Preparatory School, Danvers, Massachusetts from 1949 to 1953. He attended Merrimack College, North Andover, Massachusetts, for one year from 1953 to 1954. He was received into the Order of St. Augustine as a novice on September 9, 1954, and after a year at Good Counsel Novitiate, New Hamburg, New York, he professed first vows on September 10, 1955. He then attended Villanova University from 1955 to 1958 and received his BA in Philosophy. He then went to Augustinian College, Washington, DC from 1958 to 1962 for his theological studies and received an MA in Religious Education. He also attended the Catholic University of America for graduate courses in American History. He received an MA in Modern European History from Villanova University from 1958 to 1961. He professed solemn vows on September 10, 1958. He was ordained to the priesthood on February 3, 1962, in the Christ the Teacher Chapel, Merrimack College, by Richard Cardinal Cushing.

Fr. Kevin’s first assignment was to Saint Thomas Monastery and to Villanova University as a teacher from 1962 to 1963. In 1963, he was assigned to Merrimack College, where he was to spend the rest of the years of active ministry for the Province. He resided at Our Mother of Good Counsel Monastery from 1963 to 1994, Saint Augustine Friary, Summer Street from 1994 to 2002, Our Mother of Good Counsel Monastery from 2002 to 2004, Austin House from 2004 to 2016, in North Andover, Massachusetts and St. Augustine Friary in Andover from 2016 to 2025. During his more than forty years at Merrimack College he headed the Department of Religious and Theological Studies from 1973 to 1978 and from 1989 to 1990, was the Archivist of the College from 1968 to 2002, and taught hundreds of students during all those years in the classroom. When he was awarded an honorary doctorate from Merrimack College in 2007, he said, “Helping our students to mature as educated people of faith has been my passion, my goal and my vocation during my forty-four years of teaching at Merrimack. It is thrilling to be given this wonderful honor by the college that I love so much.” In 2012 Fr. Kevin retired from teaching but continued doing research and writing on the life of Fr. Joseph Dougherty, O.S.A. who was a Prior Provincial of the Province of St. Thomas of Villanova. Because of illness, he went into palliative care and peacefully died August 23, 2025 at Mary Immaculate Nursing Home in Lawrence, Massachusetts.