Sr. Angela Ann Zukowski, M.H.S.H., D.Min., has spent decades showing the Catholic Church and University of Dayton what becomes possible when deep faith meets bold imagination. Recently, her mission-minded, entrepreneurial spirit was recognized with the Salesian Guild’s Lifetime Achievement Award.
Zukowski is executive director of the University’s Institute for Pastoral Initiatives and a professor in the UD Department of Theology and Religious Studies.
Established in 1944, the Salesian Guild of Catholic Communicators of Greater Cincinnati, offers Catholic communicators in the Greater Cincinnati and Northern Kentucky area a spiritual connection to each other and their Creator, through fellowship, shared faith and dialogue, inspired by the spirit of St. Francis de Sales, the patron saint of writers. Its members include people in media, education, public-relations, non-profit communications or diocesan/parish offices.
Zukowski was nominated and chosen to receive the Lifetime Achievement Award this year, becoming the first woman to receive this prestigious honor, which has only been presented three other times in the guild’s 80+ years. The previous recipients were Bishop Carl K. Moeddel, Greg Olberding and William R. Burleigh.
In 2004, Zukowski also received the guild’s annual Communicator of the Year Award, which is given to a Catholic communicator who exemplifies the guild’s core values of integrity, professionalism, fellowship and idealism.
The guild’s criteria for these awards includes individuals who have demonstrated excellent communication skills, who have upheld religious values and who have created lasting impact. The fact that Zukowski has now received both of these awards from the guild signifies her as a bright beacon in the Archdiocese of Cincinnati, radiating an entire lifetime of these shared traits. But her influence doesn’t stop in Ohio.
To illustrate how far her contributions have spanned, we can look to who first nominated her for this honor: University of Dayton President Eric F. Spina. In his nomination letter, he detailed Zukowski’s history of innovation, going back to when she first began at UD more than 45 years ago.
Spina wrote, “In the early 1980s, on the cusp of the information technology revolution, a huge satellite dish — her brainchild — was installed in a campus parking lot to receive religious programming from the Catholic Telecommunications Network of America. This satellite dish stood as a symbol of faith — the belief that technology could be harnessed to share the Gospel message.”
This core belief is the heart of all Zukowski seeks to do. Spina expounded on this by distinguishing her as a “pioneer in the use of emerging communication technologies to evangelize and educate … the global scope of her work is truly remarkable."
The "global scope" of her work is manifested in her role as executive director of the Institute for Pastoral Initiatives, which Spina described as “an innovation center unlike any other on a Catholic campus … a place where faith meets culture, where new ways to communicate about the Catholic faith in the digital age are piloted.”
While leading the institute in the early 2000s, Zukowski oversaw the creation and development of the Virtual Learning Community for Faith Formation (VLCFF), a cutting-edge initiative that embraced distance-learning in the early days of the internet.
Spina described the VLCFF as “the premier provider of e-learning to the global Catholic Church,” as it offers more than 200 online courses in English, Spanish, Arabic and French — from social justice to Church history, Scriptural studies, youth ministry, disabilities ministry and more. With over 5,500 students enrolled each year, this platform continues to support catechists, lay leadership/ministry and adult faith formation in more than 70 Catholic dioceses and 40+ countries around the world, while also remaining aware of the world’s technological shifts and adapting accordingly.
Zukowski has co-written books and articles on communication, delivered workshops and lectures around the world, and taught countless courses for graduate and undergraduate students, including a course for the Chaminade Scholars program. She also coordinated the Forum for Young Catechetical Leaders and served on the Vatican’s Pontifical Council for Social Communications from 1989-2001. In addition, she was president of the International Catholic Association for Radio and Television. She received the Pro Ecclesia et Pontifice medal from Pope John Paul II, as well as the Monika K. Hellwig Award for Outstanding Contributions to Catholic Intellectual Life from the Association of Catholic Colleges and Universities, among other national and international recognitions.
Zukowski’s journey led to the Salesian Guild’s Annual Gathering in Cincinnati, where on April 25 she was presented with the Lifetime Achievement Award by Amelia Riedel, one of her former students.
At the ceremony, Riedel said: “It has been 35 years since I last sat in a classroom with our honoree, yet when I recently had the joy of calling Sister Angela Ann Zukowski to share news of this award, the sound of her voice transported me instantly back to the Roesch Library at the University of Dayton. As a senior fulfilling my religion requirement, I enrolled in her Spirituality and Religious Education course with the modest hope of one day volunteering as a parish religion teacher. I left that class with far more than instructional tools. I left with a model of what a woman of faith, intellect and global imagination could be.
“Sister Angela Ann inspired me not only to teach in my parish school of religion, but to envision a broader horizon for women in the Church. She would casually mention returning from Rome or another corner of the world, and those stories — woven between lessons on spirituality and catechesis — quietly expanded my understanding of vocation, leadership and possibility. Over the decades since, I have followed her work with admiration, watching her shape Catholic communication and education with characteristic courage and creativity.”
As detailed in Riedel’s testimonial and Spina’s nomination, Zukowski has inspired the world by living a life dedicated to finding new ways of expressing faith. Spina summarized this trademark boldness with a line that could almost serve as her motto: “Some people ask, ‘Why?’ She asks, ‘Why not?’”
From all of us at the University of Dayton, we congratulate Sr. Angela Ann Zukowski for this amazing accomplishment. May her kind of spirit encourage others to live with the same boldness and faith.
Top photo: Sr. Angela Ann Zukowski and Amelia Riedel.
Second photo: Sr. Angela Ann Zukowski receiving the Lifetime Achievement Award.
Third photo: Sr. Angela Ann Zukowski during the 1980s with the campus satellite dish.
Bottom photo: Sr. Angela Ann Zukowski with friends and supporters at the Salesian Guild award ceremony.