January 26, 2021
In Memoriam: Very Rev. Walter Urban Voll, O.P., S.T.M. ’45 & ’97Hon., priest and theological scholar
By Charles C. Joyce
When Providence College awarded an honorary Doctor of Religious Education degree to Very Rev. Walter Urban Voll, O.P., S.T.M. ’45 & ’97Hon. in 1997, it was apt recognition of the life and contributions of a scholar who never stopped learning.
Father Voll, who taught theology in Catholic higher education settings — including PC — for 40 years, and who maintained his passion for studying theology long after his active priestly ministry ended, died on Sunday, Jan. 24, at St. Patrick’s Manor in Framingham, Mass., at the age of 98.
A member of the Dominican Community of the Priory of St. Thomas Aquinas, he had lived in the campus priory from 1997-2018, when his health declined.
A Dominican priest for 70 years, Father Voll taught at and served his alma mater in a variety of positions in both his younger and later years of his active ministry. He began his teaching ministry at the College in 1950, teaching theology and English for two years. He returned in 1984, teaching theology until 1990. Originally a visiting professor, he was promoted to professor of religious studies in 1986.
Father Voll also served as prior of St. Thomas Aquinas Priory from 1990-93, was a member of the PC Board of Trustees from 1992-97, and was chair of the PC Corporation from 1993-97 when he served as prior provincial of the Dominican Province of St. Joseph.
One of his closest associates at the College, Rev. James F. Quigley, O.P. ’60, former associate professor of theology and now an associate chaplain of the PC National Alumni Association, got to know Father Voll while studying for the priesthood at the Dominican House of Studies in Washington, D.C. Father Voll was assistant student master and played an integral role in Father Quigley’s priestly formation.
Later, when Father Quigley was doing his doctoral studies at the University of St. Thomas (The Angelicum) in Rome, Father Voll was his mentor and oversaw his dissertation on “Implicit Faith in St. Thomas Aquinas.” The pair later were reunited as theology faculty colleagues at PC in the 1980s, not long after each had taught in Rome.
Father Voll’s intense interest in moral theology and Aquinas impressed Father Quigley.
“He was just a voracious reader all his life, a fan of the knowledge and understanding of the theology of Thomas Aquinas,” said Father Quigley. “He was constantly reading and studying even in his later life … theology, Church politics, and just staying up on things.”
Father Quigley recalled several of his scholar-friend’s contributions in his field. Father Voll was the editor for moral theology for the Catholic Theological Encyclopedia in the late 1960s and wrote several entries on subjects in moral theology for the New Catholic Encyclopedia and the Encyclopedic Dictionary of Religion. He also had dozens of articles, chapters, translations, and book reviews published in journals and other publications including The Thomist, Angelicum, Dominicana, and The Rosary Magazine.
A native of Syracuse, N.Y., Father Voll enrolled in the Guzman Hall pre-cclesiastical program at PC shortly after graduating from the Christian Brothers’ Academy in 1940. He was awarded his bachelor’s degree in classics from the College in 1945.
He began his studies in theology and philosophy after entering the novitiate of the Order of Preachers in 1942 at St. Rose Priory in Springfield, Ky., where he was given the religious name Urban. He made his first profession of vows there on in 1943, then moved to St. Joseph’s Priory in Somerset, Ohio, to study philosophy. He studied theology at the Pontifical Faculty of the Immaculate Conception at the Dominican House of Studies in Washington from 1946-50, earning his lectorate and licentiate in sacred theology. While in Washington, he also received a master’s degree in English Renaissance literature from The Catholic University of America in 1951.
He was ordained a priest on June 9, 1949, in St. Dominic Church in Washington by Bishop Edward Celestine Daly, O.P., S.T.M. of Des Moines, Iowa.
In 1961, Father Voll was awarded a doctorate in sacred theology in moral theology from the Pontifical Faculty of the Immaculate Conception. In 1967, he received the Dominican Order’s highest academic honor, the degree of master of sacred theology (S.T.M.), in recognition of his exam performance.
After beginning his long teaching ministry at PC in 1952, he taught for various periods at Trinity College in Washington, D.C., the College of St. Mary of the Springs in Columbus, Ohio, Xaverian College in Silver Spring, Md., The Catholic University of America, the Pontifical Faculty of the Immaculate Conception, Barry College in Miami, Fla., St. Vincent de Paul Seminary in Boynton Beach, Fla., and at the Pontifical Faculty of St. Thomas (The Angelicum) in Rome. Following that latter assignment from 1981-84, he returned to teach at PC.
While serving as the first rector of St. Vincent de Paul Seminary from 1973-80, Father Voll was responsible for building an institution — located as it is at the northern gateway to Latin America — that could prepare priests for an increasingly Hispanic Catholic community. He regarded these seven years as among the most fruitful in his life.
Father Voll is survived by several nieces, nephews, grandnieces, and grandnephews, and by his Dominican brothers. He was pre-deceased by his parents, Walter and Genevieve (Morrissey) Voll, and by his siblings, Gene Voll, Genevieve Voll Rafferty, and Kevin Voll.
His body will be received into the Chapel of Our Lady of the Rosary at the Priory of St. Thomas Aquinas on campus at 4 p.m. on Friday, Jan. 29, followed by the celebration of the Office of the Dead at 5:30 p.m. His Mass of Christian Burial will be celebrated in the priory chapel at 10 a.m. on Saturday, Jan. 30. COVID-19 protocols restrict these services to Dominican friars and close family members.
Burial will follow in the Dominican Friars’ Cemetery on campus.
Contributions in his name may be made to the Dominican Scholarship Fund in care of Providence College, Office of Institutional Advancement, One Cunningham Square, Providence, RI 02918.
