How ironic — Bishop Martin comes in and does the exact opposite of what would make Charlotte need a new Cathedral. If you want seminaries to empty and morale to plummet, follow the +Martin blueprint.
Honestly, I doubt it came up. Whatever Pope Leo feels about the TLM, I doubt it is on his top 50 list. Only a small slither of the global Catholic population are involved in the TLM.
I think you would win that bet. They probably have 9-5/M-F jobs not weekend work and J.I.T. scheduling, probably own cars and are not dependent on erratic public transit, probably come from socio-cultural situations where they were well served pastorally and had accessible churches their whole life, probably are engaged and communicated with by clergy in their native language, probably are not lying in a Medicaid bed, and a host of other factors.
Five specific victimhood-centered excuses for not attending Mass (plus "a host of other excuses" - I mean, "factors"), impressive! And so, conversely, everybody who attends Mass regularly just MUST be a privileged elitist, obtusely wallowing in the systemic racism of their un-woke, self-indulgent, first-world-problematic lives? (Present company excepted, of course.) How amusing.
I haven’t been to a TLM Mass in Charlotte but the Novus Ordo Masses I’ve been to there (at 3 parishes downtown and one in the suburbs) are all very reverent and would’ve been affected by the changes he had proposed. I hate using political terms, but in that sense they are a more “conservative” diocese from what I’ve seen and heard from friends.
In November 2024, I went to mass at St Patrick’s Cathedral. I second your comment. Very reverent liturgy, confession prior to mass, many women veiling, etc.
Yeah. A good pastor doesn’t make major changes for a year or two.
That said designating an existing parish Church as a Cathedral has merit. Building a cathedral in the wake of the sex abuse scandal is not the best PR. And with ongoing secularization in the US, sustainability is a concern as well. As for building a Cathedral outside the city limits, that may make access easier for the Diocese as a whole.
$10M is hardly sufficient for a decent cathedral these days, especially in Charlotte's case where the primary motivation is for higher capacity. There's probably a loophole in the bequest where the money can be used for any capital improvements to the selected cathedral site, which could allow the money to be used as endowment to fund improvements over the long term. But that's just optimism speaking; I have no actual knowledge of the details.
I would be shocked if the $10 million was restricted only to construction of a new cathedral. Not that it couldn’t be, but I would imagine you’re correct that it’s simply earmarked for capital expenses tied to relocating / renovating / building a new cathedral in the broadest sense, and it’s not difficult to imagine that even designating an existing parish as a cathedral could justify more than $10 million in renovations, new office spaces, parking lot improvements, etc.
And if the costs didn’t exceed $10 million, I would imagine the remainder could be endowed such that the income from the remaining principal could be restricted to ongoing capital expenses for maintaining the relocated cathedral site. (As you also pointed out.)
The 10 million was to "begin" the project; there's no way it's the whole cost. It's hard to say no to ten million dollars but if they don't have the rest; a lower cost renovation of an existing parish might be a pretty prudent choice. His liturgical letter seemed way out of line; but "doesn't insist on huge infrastructure projects" and "moves quickly on financial governance" are imo good traits in a bishop, not to be thrown out with the bathwater.
I didn’t realize it was that high. While I can’t believe TPS folks are the wealthiest, that still would be a financial hit to the Diocese if those parishioners were to vanish.
I don't know how many Catholics in Charlotte are being protected by TPS, but Pew Research says there are 1.2 million people countrywide (0.35% of the US population). Pew also reports that 7% of the Charlotte metro area is Catholic. If we assume that 80% of those on TPS are Catholic (not an impossible assumption given how many are being protected from Latin American dictatorships), then one would expect 4% of Charlotte Catholics fall into that group. Maybe the Charlotte metro area has 10x higher concentration of immigrants protected by TPS or maybe Kurt made a math error. I don't know, but here are my sources: https://www.pewresearch.org/religious-landscape-study/metro-area/charlotte-nc/https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2024/03/29/how-temporary-protected-status-has-expanded-under-the-biden-administration/
Yeah. I'm reading that ~530,000 TPS people are now subject to deportation. Meanwhile, there are 546,370 Catholics in the diocese of Charlotte as of 2023. So, if 40% of that diocese are TPS, that's about 41% of the TPS people in the USA. Astounding if true.
Also an existing church might have a better possibility of having beautiful architecture....this bishop doesn't seem like one that would appreciate traditional Catholic beauty in art & architecture ...his idea of a brand new cathedral might look more like a mega-church or a shopping mall
Unfortunately, Charlotte is a newer city so the options for a beautiful existing parish are pretty limited. The existing church serving as the cathedral is one of the handful that meet the bill.
IDK if this means anything because it's the Episcopal Church context not the Catholic one. But when my grandpa was at the Episcopal seminary he was advised that the first 6 months of his time at a parish were the best time to make any changes. "Take advantage of the honeymoon period." When i was an Episcopalian, we saw this approach in action anytime there was a new priest. It wasn't great.
That's such a weird idea cause as seminarians we're told the opposite, wait at least a year to change anything unless it's actually urgent. The people of the parish need to know you and know that you care about them before anything changes, otherwise it's just someone asserting top down changes. Many priests I talk to have told me that once you gain that rapport with the parish and they know you care, they've seen you do funerals and visited them in the hospital, etc. then you have far more goodwill to make changes because they know and have experienced that Father cares about them.
I once had a priest (CSC) who said that he was told by his superiors that the only thing he should change in his first year at a parish was his underwear.
Perhaps we'll get another classic comment along the lines of "I just think JD Flynn is a horrible person" and provide the Pillar with more T-Shirt slogans.
Why in the world would a Roman Catholic Bishop even consider banning women from veiling, putting candles on the altar, ban preparatory prayers, etc, etc, etc? The reply that "this was just a draft" doesn't answer this. This bishop is anti-tradition in a unique and disturbing way.
I never realized what a hot item these things were for progressives until my parish got a new, young priest who leaned toward tradition. All of a sudden the gray-haired boomers were all up in arms about too many candles, incense, altar crucifix, male-only servers and latin responses. They even hated the vestment prayers, which happened in the privacy of the sacristy out of view, but I guess just knowing it was happening was enough for them. This poor priest got run out of town on a rail, and now our replacement is a foreigner nobody can understand, and none of the other young priests want this assignment.
That is so terribly sad, Andy -- you have my sympathy. I (and I'm sure others) would be interested to know how you keep your peace in such a situation.
I don't belong to any parish these days. I just travel around on Sundays. My son is getting ordained next week, so I imagine I will probably be mostly attending whatever parish he gets assigned to.
The more I hear about this guy, the more of an inept dingus he seems to be. Unless you want to petition the Apostolic See to change the territory to the Diocese of Huntersville, there is simply no defensible justification to pick a parish church 20 minutes outside of the diocesan see (can you even do that and retain the name? The Eparchy of Parma is not the Eparchy of Cleveland, even though Parma is just an exurb of Cleveland).
Throwing an eight-figure capital gift right out the door?! Listen, I'm as big a critic of "appease the money" as any of the other venerable regular-commenters here, but that's just mind-boggling; pretty much disrespecting a donor *while* he's throwing cash at you, and telling him to pound sand.
This guy is not right in the head. He should not be in charge of anything at this point. Leo XIV needs to put this nincompoop out to pasture via forced retirement, for the benefit of the entire Universal Church (because now this nimrod is generating international headlines!)
OK, so I'm not defending the alternative site for the cathedral, but I want to put up a word of caution about that $10M. Sometimes, people give you just enough money to tempt you to borrow the rest, and you end up in trouble. I've seen this happen; let me say that much and no more.
Sometimes the best answer to a gift is, "That was beautiful, but it's not enough."
Correction: Cleveland is merely the largest municipality in the Greater Parma Metropolitan Area. 9 out of 10 guys who live in small postwar ranch houses with pink flamingos in their '20x'20 yard and wear white socks with all outfits for all occasions strongly agree. 1 out of 10 is listening to polka music too loud to actually hear the question.
I’ve often wondered if he ever received an award for his ad campaigns? How many people can just put a picture of their eyebrows on a billboard, and you know what it’s for? Pretty impressive.
I once sent an email to JD and Ed (in response to the Dyngus Day podcast one year) telling them that Parma is the true home of Dyngus Day. Not Buffalo!
Huh. My only experience of the Diocese of Charlotte was of a priest at the ambo telling the men they need to wear pants, not shorts, to Mass. I’m in shock that the priests haven’t revolted against these actions yet.
I am a parishioner of that parish in Huntersville, and we DO NOT want him taking over our beloved, traditional, parish!! He would destroy the culture of our parish!
I visited your parish a few months ago while traveling, and it was a beautiful building with a gorgeously reverent Mass. Afterwards, my husband said that it seemed like the ideal parish, something he'd never yet encountered.
I actually once had a complete stranger who used to work relatively high up in the diocese of Tyler (I verified this fact) reach out to me on social media because he saw a criticism I’d made of a different church leader who’s less prominent but similar in character to Strickland. He proceeded to kvetch over IM about a range of leadership issues he’d witnessed in Tyler and even though he never explicitly laid any of his complaints at Bishop Strickland’s feet, it wasn’t too difficult to read between the lines and conclude he had problems with the bishop.
This was long before Strickland had been removed from office, so to be perfectly frank I feel pretty confident that there were other problems leading to Strickland’s ouster we likely don’t know much about, and he took an aggressively anti-Francis posture to deflect attention from whatever his leadership failures were and turn himself into a martyr.
That’s all just my musings based on somewhat impromptu social media interactions with a stranger, but as much as I like what Strickland stands for in theory, my takeaway about him is still, as you say, “a loon’s a loon.”
Please no. We have some excellent priests in the Charlotte diocese who would merit a promotion before bringing in another outside guy with a talent for attracting negative nationwide attention.
While I admire zeal - Bishop Strickland said Mass with a known Sedecantist recently (a “friend” of the Pillar). There were most definitely reasons beyond politics he was removed from Tyler.
I thought this rare species of bishop, very common in the 1970's and 1980's, the Cardinal Bernardin/Mahoney species, had gone extinct. Bishop Martin is very backwards and has to learn that we are living in the era of Cardinals Cupich, Tobin, and McElroy, the "undermine the morals of the faithful by promoting perversion and theological heresy, but let them enjoy their liturgy"-sort of bishop. The "tear down the altar rails" Bishop Martin is probably not even liked by the liberals in the Vatican, who have learned that those types of policies lead to counter-revolution by the faithful in the pews, and therefore are counterproductive in leading souls to Hell. Now that Archbishop Paglia has retired from the Pontifical Academy for Life, maybe he should travel to North Carolina along with the Jesuit Father Martin to teach Bishop Martin how to effectively undermine the morals of the faithful in his diocese rather than ticking them off by messing up their liturgy.
It was Cupich and James Martin who propelled Bishop Martin into his office. I think his policies are very much in line with their sensibilities, even if he is much less politically adept at implementing them.
I think Cardinal Cupich is the most destructive bishop in United States history, but he has never implemented stupid diocesan-wide policies like Bishop Martin. I attend Mass in the Archdiocese of Chicago and there are several parishes with Novus Ordo Masses where all the faithful receive Communion on the tongue at altar rails, where only altar boys can serve, where Communion is given only under one species, where only priests distribute Communion, etc. Cupich undermines the Faith by closing down beautiful churches, by downgrading or harassing good pastors, by kicking out conservative religious orders from diocesan owned or controlled property, by expelling solid seminarians, by promoting heretics and careerists, by supporting heretical teaching in Catholic schools, universities and seminaries, by terrorizing the priests in his archdiocese. He has eliminated the Traditional Latin Mass from being celebrated on the first Sunday of each month and basically exiled the Institute of Christ the Sovereign Priest from the Archdiocese (he let them keep their shrine, but they cannot celebrate public Mass there).
But he has also, ironically, continued the Pope Leo XIII Institute at Mundelein Seminary which trains exorcists from various dioceses, designated some of the more conservative parish churches to have Holy Doors with the indulgences associated with the Jubilee Year, and tolerated conservative liturgical practices at some prominent parishes.
That Bishop Martin has gotten in trouble with the Vatican in less than one year of being bishop, while Cupich stealthily advanced in the hierarchy, first in the conservative Archdiocese of Omaha, and then under Pope John Paul II and Pope Benedict XVI as rector of the conservative Pontifical College Josephinum and later Bishop of Rapid City and Spokane tells me Bishop Martin is a rather poor student of Cupich who has now garnered world-wide attention for his incompetence when smart liberals know they have to be sneaky to be successful.
I'm really sorry to hear how Cupich is persecuting the faithful in Chicago. His vicious hatred of traditional Catholics is famous around the country, though we rarely hear the details. I remember how he had Fr. Phillips removed over false abuse allegations, and refused to allow his return even after he was cleared. However, I hadn't heard that he banned the Institute of Christ the King from saying mass. Saddling them with the burden of maintaining a shrine without any income from masses and parish life is particularly cruel. If an ideologue bishop on the right had been half as cruel as Cupich, he would have been called to Rome and told to stop long ago. There is no room in a functional hierarchy for such vicious cruelty toward the faithful.
The recent history of the shrine run by Institute of Christ the King is the reason Cupich has not stripped them of it completely. It was meant to be bulldozed under Cardinal George when it was a closed diocesan church. A group of liberal Aldermen had grew up in that Irish parish in south Chicago and so they made the Church a historical landmark. Since Cardinal George now could not destroy it, he sold it to the Institute, who started major renovations until a fire destroyed even more of the interior, but the Institute started rebuilding it again until Cardinal Cupich shut them down, because they would not celebrate Novus Ordo Masses on first Sundays (the Institute cannot according to their Vatican approved statutes). Since Cupich cannot demolish it and sell it to some secular developer for profit, he left them the property to keep for now. I think they are waiting it out until the next Archbishop, as the shrine is in a good location, near the University of Chicago.
Not long after he arrived, he gave a speech to a group of clergy that was far from encouraging. As I was leaving, there were two guys walking near me I recognized — neither of whom I took for pillars of tradition or conservatism, and whose names I don’t recall; I heard one say to the other, “Let’s not wait; let’s start hating him now.”
But he wants to with a very comprehensive plan. Cardinal Cupich has been Archbishop of Chicago for over 10 years and has not implemented any archdiocesan-wide liturgical restriction except for limitations on the TLM.
Cupich has told priests not to put a kneeler in front of the Communion line, but that has not been universally followed and it has not affected altar rails. I know of at least 5 parishes where at Novus Ordo Masses Communion is distributed to nearly everyone or everyone kneeling and on the tongue. Those are the ones I personally know of, but I am sure there are more. I will not name them because of the liberal snitches and spies who also read the Pillar.
I mean that there are many seminarians at Mundelein Seminary that had to leave, including one who I met wearing a cassock at a charity gala who I complemented for wearing the cassock and who told me to pray for him because the diocese was reviewing him for being too conservative. The next year he was not on the list of seminarians. One priest had his priestly ordination delayed for one year so he could be monitored because of his traditional liturgical tendencies. The Archdiocese had on average 10 ordinations a year under Cardinal George. This year, two priests were ordained, last year 3 were ordained, but one of them each year was from the Canons Regular of St. John Cantius, a traditionalist religious order under the Archbishop of Chicago. These Canons are tolerated by Cupich because they bring in a lot of money for the Diocesan Appeal and have prominent, wealthy supporters, but even though there are nearly 20 priests in this order, they only run two parishes in the Archdiocese assigned to them by Cardinal George.
That is not good. But how conservative is too conservative?Are these guys Bishop Barron or Cardinal O’Mallet types or are they closer to a cardinal Burke type? Are they seeking other dioceses?
None of the men you mentioned are heretical or schismatic in any way. Just the opposite, they're more loyal to the Church and HF than Jimmy Martin S.J.
Cardinal Burke is a priest in good standing, and though his style might not be to your liking, he’s not an extremist or schismatic like Vigano or Fr. Altman
Danny who replied to my first comment said there was, and I don't know enough to say there is not. Cardinal Cupich is on the Dicastry for Bishops which usually chooses new bishops (unless the Pope decides to name a bishop without their recommendation), so I am sure he was at least partially involved with Bishop Martin's nomination.
I wonder why he is in such a rush? I used to live in that diocese. I can do nothing but pray for Bishop Martin and the Catholics in the Diocese of Charlotte.
Like so many bishops, he seems to think he has a mandate from God to install his personal vision i the diocese. Why else was he chosen? Seems he spent too much time teaching/administrating than being a shepherd in his career. And zero experience running a large multi-faceted organization like a diocese. 12 years at Duke as a chaplain is not suitable experience to leanr to govern a large organization like this diocese. This is why it is a mistake to make someone a bishop then put them in charge of a large diocese rather than making them an auxiliary bishop first. This poor fella is ill-equipped for the job due to lack of training -- not his fault.
I wonder if his experience as a chaplain at Duke shaped him in a way that makes him feel that his current actions are permissible and even desired. I’ve been to several Catholic/Newman centers, and generally they have a more emotive and less traditional vibe, much more focused on community than liturgy. From my personal experience, it wasn’t until after college that I truly desired more traditional liturgy. I felt that I was in a new phase of life, and the “college liturgy” no longer meant as much, particularly as I couldn’t relate as much to the college kids even a few years out of college. Perhaps the Bishop misunderstands the enthusiasm of college kids in a more communal atmosphere and feels he can broaden it to the whole diocese, without understanding that different parishioners are in different periods of life and seek different things.
Additionally, college kids seem to rarely oppose authority figures and their instructions, perhaps he was unprepared for such pushback, as I doubt this pushback would happen at Duke. This may lead to an “I know best” mentality, and ironically make him less “synodal”, as he has had little experience with parishes with more diverse populations.
It always seems to me that campus ministry-assigned priests, for good or ill, sink into the habit of “imprinting” their preferences, outlooks, and personalities on the very malleable young adults “finding themselves” in college. I tend to find this problematic even when dealing with very good priests, but even more so when it’s a more troublesome priest.
My intuition here is that Bishop Martin is accustomed to, and rather likes and insists upon, the notion that he’s some kind of charismatic and transformative leader and doesn’t realize that it’s just a by-product of the kind of people he’d previously been called to pastor.
It’s healthy for bishops to learn they’re about 40% “leaders” and about 60% “servants,” which is quite an inversion of how campus ministry chaplains get to operate.
Seems more like a temperament problem. Experience might round off some edges, but experience teaches that the fundamental personality will remain, and remain problematic.
In January, he received an open letter respectfully asking him to slow down his pace of change in the diocese, in April he has a meeting with Bishop Prevost encouraging him to do the same.
In May, despite the council of now Pope Leo, he pushes forward with decisions about the location of the cathedral, and "liturgical reforms" that are unnecessary and unpopular.
I’m noticing a trend: it seems as certain parts of the Church distance themselves from orthodoxy, they end up decreasing the diversity that is welcome in the Church. Rather than a beautiful symphony of parts, the result is a forced monotony of Church practice. Or, in the case of Germany, a frantic mishmash of behaviors that are so far off in left field. The extremes have become more pronounced.
Hot take: converting a parish into a cathedral is an abusive practice that should only be done 1) as a last resort and 2) after getting the eager consent of the parishioners.
To be fair, it is not without reason. St. Mark's as a parish is already very large and influential. I think it may be the largest parish in the Diocese (fact check needed). And it is not so far outside of the city of Charlotte. There is also precedent to converting a parish into a cathedral (sometimes a "co-cathedral).
In the neighboring Diocese of Raleigh, Bishop Burbidge built a new cathedral (the former cathedral sits around 250; new one closer to 2500). This was ultimately a very good decision, but it came with a lot of challenges. Many people decried the project as a waste of money, etc. So a Bishop can never please everybody.
That's just some counter points to consider. But at the end of the day, I think Charlotte ought to build a new cathedral; hopefully something beautiful and long-lasting.
The fact that the parish is large just means doing spiritual damage to more people in the process.
Yes, there will always people who will say the perfume should be sold and the money given to the poor. If a bishop is really worried about these people, he can just stay where he is.
It would be one thing if there bishop were forced out his cathedral, such as by arson (see Madison WI). But this is the bishop choosing to relocate.
Actually, the decision that a new cathedral was needed was not made by Bishop Martin, but by his predecessor, Bishop Jugis (who is widely lauded as traditional) and by diocesan planning. +Martin has inherited that decision.
Also, the idea is totally bizarre that being named a Cathedral spiritually damages a group of people. Why would that be the case?
The point is that there is a working—if inconvenient—cathedral. This is very different from circumstances where a cathedral needs to be named because none exists. Hence, this is a voluntary choice. Most people appreciate that the diocese would benefit from having a larger cathedral; that aspect is not particularly controversial. The controversy is how to get a larger cathedral, and the successor is not ipso facto bound my the decisions of his predecessor.
On contrary, it is entirely bizarre to think that being named a cathedral would cause no spiritual damage to the parish community. It radically disrupts the parish life, changes the use and availability or resources, fundamentally alters the relationship between the people and the leadership of the parish, and creates new completion between local and diocesan priorities. Changing pastors can be damaging enough as it is, but at least the new pastor is focused on that community. But a bishop and all that comes with him is a massive sea change, and one that doesn’t have the best interests of that local community as its focus.
How ironic — Bishop Martin comes in and does the exact opposite of what would make Charlotte need a new Cathedral. If you want seminaries to empty and morale to plummet, follow the +Martin blueprint.
I just hope there aren't many chickens in North Carolina.
#PillarReaderThings
I hear Westphalia has some he can borrow
Stay tuned for my upcoming novel!
Please let this become a thing
Are your sources saying they've never discussed the TLM assault?
His instructions regarding the TLM hadn't been released when their meeting took place.
Yes, but by the time the Vatican planted this story they had been and there had been opportunity for Martin to give Leo a heads up.
Honestly, I doubt it came up. Whatever Pope Leo feels about the TLM, I doubt it is on his top 50 list. Only a small slither of the global Catholic population are involved in the TLM.
0.2% in the Diocese of Charlotte.
I'll bet that, as a percentage of weekly Mass-goers, that number should be a good deal larger.
I think you would win that bet. They probably have 9-5/M-F jobs not weekend work and J.I.T. scheduling, probably own cars and are not dependent on erratic public transit, probably come from socio-cultural situations where they were well served pastorally and had accessible churches their whole life, probably are engaged and communicated with by clergy in their native language, probably are not lying in a Medicaid bed, and a host of other factors.
Five specific victimhood-centered excuses for not attending Mass (plus "a host of other excuses" - I mean, "factors"), impressive! And so, conversely, everybody who attends Mass regularly just MUST be a privileged elitist, obtusely wallowing in the systemic racism of their un-woke, self-indulgent, first-world-problematic lives? (Present company excepted, of course.) How amusing.
Gee, Chuck, I said I thought you would win your bet.
I haven’t been to a TLM Mass in Charlotte but the Novus Ordo Masses I’ve been to there (at 3 parishes downtown and one in the suburbs) are all very reverent and would’ve been affected by the changes he had proposed. I hate using political terms, but in that sense they are a more “conservative” diocese from what I’ve seen and heard from friends.
In November 2024, I went to mass at St Patrick’s Cathedral. I second your comment. Very reverent liturgy, confession prior to mass, many women veiling, etc.
Sliver?
Yeah. A good pastor doesn’t make major changes for a year or two.
That said designating an existing parish Church as a Cathedral has merit. Building a cathedral in the wake of the sex abuse scandal is not the best PR. And with ongoing secularization in the US, sustainability is a concern as well. As for building a Cathedral outside the city limits, that may make access easier for the Diocese as a whole.
Still, the guy has not yet been there a year.
All true. But what of that $10 million bequest?
$10M is hardly sufficient for a decent cathedral these days, especially in Charlotte's case where the primary motivation is for higher capacity. There's probably a loophole in the bequest where the money can be used for any capital improvements to the selected cathedral site, which could allow the money to be used as endowment to fund improvements over the long term. But that's just optimism speaking; I have no actual knowledge of the details.
I would be shocked if the $10 million was restricted only to construction of a new cathedral. Not that it couldn’t be, but I would imagine you’re correct that it’s simply earmarked for capital expenses tied to relocating / renovating / building a new cathedral in the broadest sense, and it’s not difficult to imagine that even designating an existing parish as a cathedral could justify more than $10 million in renovations, new office spaces, parking lot improvements, etc.
And if the costs didn’t exceed $10 million, I would imagine the remainder could be endowed such that the income from the remaining principal could be restricted to ongoing capital expenses for maintaining the relocated cathedral site. (As you also pointed out.)
The 10 million was to "begin" the project; there's no way it's the whole cost. It's hard to say no to ten million dollars but if they don't have the rest; a lower cost renovation of an existing parish might be a pretty prudent choice. His liturgical letter seemed way out of line; but "doesn't insist on huge infrastructure projects" and "moves quickly on financial governance" are imo good traits in a bishop, not to be thrown out with the bathwater.
The diocese is booming, packed churches, lots of building going on.
True, and I hope and pray it remains that way. But that is certainly not guaranteed.
40% of the Catholics in the Diocese are under TPS, which is being rescinded. The boom is about to crash, big time.
I didn’t realize it was that high. While I can’t believe TPS folks are the wealthiest, that still would be a financial hit to the Diocese if those parishioners were to vanish.
What’s your source for this figure? I’m curious.
I don't know how many Catholics in Charlotte are being protected by TPS, but Pew Research says there are 1.2 million people countrywide (0.35% of the US population). Pew also reports that 7% of the Charlotte metro area is Catholic. If we assume that 80% of those on TPS are Catholic (not an impossible assumption given how many are being protected from Latin American dictatorships), then one would expect 4% of Charlotte Catholics fall into that group. Maybe the Charlotte metro area has 10x higher concentration of immigrants protected by TPS or maybe Kurt made a math error. I don't know, but here are my sources: https://www.pewresearch.org/religious-landscape-study/metro-area/charlotte-nc/ https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2024/03/29/how-temporary-protected-status-has-expanded-under-the-biden-administration/
Yeah. I'm reading that ~530,000 TPS people are now subject to deportation. Meanwhile, there are 546,370 Catholics in the diocese of Charlotte as of 2023. So, if 40% of that diocese are TPS, that's about 41% of the TPS people in the USA. Astounding if true.
Also an existing church might have a better possibility of having beautiful architecture....this bishop doesn't seem like one that would appreciate traditional Catholic beauty in art & architecture ...his idea of a brand new cathedral might look more like a mega-church or a shopping mall
Unfortunately, Charlotte is a newer city so the options for a beautiful existing parish are pretty limited. The existing church serving as the cathedral is one of the handful that meet the bill.
IDK if this means anything because it's the Episcopal Church context not the Catholic one. But when my grandpa was at the Episcopal seminary he was advised that the first 6 months of his time at a parish were the best time to make any changes. "Take advantage of the honeymoon period." When i was an Episcopalian, we saw this approach in action anytime there was a new priest. It wasn't great.
That's such a weird idea cause as seminarians we're told the opposite, wait at least a year to change anything unless it's actually urgent. The people of the parish need to know you and know that you care about them before anything changes, otherwise it's just someone asserting top down changes. Many priests I talk to have told me that once you gain that rapport with the parish and they know you care, they've seen you do funerals and visited them in the hospital, etc. then you have far more goodwill to make changes because they know and have experienced that Father cares about them.
I once had a priest (CSC) who said that he was told by his superiors that the only thing he should change in his first year at a parish was his underwear.
I love the CSCs!
The Pillar is about to earn a new Pillar reader - not in a good way
Perhaps we'll get another classic comment along the lines of "I just think JD Flynn is a horrible person" and provide the Pillar with more T-Shirt slogans.
Or perhaps yet another empty threat of legal action against the Pillar.
I'm still hoping for a, "No. No, no. We're done, JD. We're done." T-shirt
oh I'm too new to the Pillar for this quote but am assuming its not charitable to inquire the source of this very very amusing citation ;)
Why in the world would a Roman Catholic Bishop even consider banning women from veiling, putting candles on the altar, ban preparatory prayers, etc, etc, etc? The reply that "this was just a draft" doesn't answer this. This bishop is anti-tradition in a unique and disturbing way.
..."anti-tradition in a unique and disturbing," profoundly anti-Catholic way.
I never realized what a hot item these things were for progressives until my parish got a new, young priest who leaned toward tradition. All of a sudden the gray-haired boomers were all up in arms about too many candles, incense, altar crucifix, male-only servers and latin responses. They even hated the vestment prayers, which happened in the privacy of the sacristy out of view, but I guess just knowing it was happening was enough for them. This poor priest got run out of town on a rail, and now our replacement is a foreigner nobody can understand, and none of the other young priests want this assignment.
That is so terribly sad, Andy -- you have my sympathy. I (and I'm sure others) would be interested to know how you keep your peace in such a situation.
I don't belong to any parish these days. I just travel around on Sundays. My son is getting ordained next week, so I imagine I will probably be mostly attending whatever parish he gets assigned to.
Blessings on you, your son, and your whole family, Andy. I hope he is assigned to a parish that nurtures his calling and that makes you feel at home.
The more I hear about this guy, the more of an inept dingus he seems to be. Unless you want to petition the Apostolic See to change the territory to the Diocese of Huntersville, there is simply no defensible justification to pick a parish church 20 minutes outside of the diocesan see (can you even do that and retain the name? The Eparchy of Parma is not the Eparchy of Cleveland, even though Parma is just an exurb of Cleveland).
Throwing an eight-figure capital gift right out the door?! Listen, I'm as big a critic of "appease the money" as any of the other venerable regular-commenters here, but that's just mind-boggling; pretty much disrespecting a donor *while* he's throwing cash at you, and telling him to pound sand.
This guy is not right in the head. He should not be in charge of anything at this point. Leo XIV needs to put this nincompoop out to pasture via forced retirement, for the benefit of the entire Universal Church (because now this nimrod is generating international headlines!)
“Inept dingus” Love it 🤣
OK, so I'm not defending the alternative site for the cathedral, but I want to put up a word of caution about that $10M. Sometimes, people give you just enough money to tempt you to borrow the rest, and you end up in trouble. I've seen this happen; let me say that much and no more.
Sometimes the best answer to a gift is, "That was beautiful, but it's not enough."
Correction: Cleveland is merely the largest municipality in the Greater Parma Metropolitan Area. 9 out of 10 guys who live in small postwar ranch houses with pink flamingos in their '20x'20 yard and wear white socks with all outfits for all occasions strongly agree. 1 out of 10 is listening to polka music too loud to actually hear the question.
Parma über alles! From Vermilion to Erie, may length of days and prosperity grace her ever-expanding borders!
Tim Misny can be the Parma legate to the UN - he'll make the international community pay!
A Tim Misny reference...this is quality Clevleand lore.
I’ve often wondered if he ever received an award for his ad campaigns? How many people can just put a picture of their eyebrows on a billboard, and you know what it’s for? Pretty impressive.
Incredible.
I once sent an email to JD and Ed (in response to the Dyngus Day podcast one year) telling them that Parma is the true home of Dyngus Day. Not Buffalo!
No. South Bend Indiana is. That's the day the politicking in the city begins.
Huh. My only experience of the Diocese of Charlotte was of a priest at the ambo telling the men they need to wear pants, not shorts, to Mass. I’m in shock that the priests haven’t revolted against these actions yet.
I admire that priest for that exhortation. Even though they do go all the way up, nobody wants to see my legs.
Psalm 147:10 - He hath no pleasure in the strength of an horse: neither delighteth he in any
man's legs.
I am a parishioner of that parish in Huntersville, and we DO NOT want him taking over our beloved, traditional, parish!! He would destroy the culture of our parish!
Maybe that's just what he's trying to do...
I visited your parish a few months ago while traveling, and it was a beautiful building with a gorgeously reverent Mass. Afterwards, my husband said that it seemed like the ideal parish, something he'd never yet encountered.
I hope nothing changes for you.
Are you proposed to your parish becoming a Cathedral in principle, or just under this particular bishop?
Maybe they could swap this guy out for the old bishop from Tyler
Eh, that comes with its own baggage. A loon's a loon. I'd rather wish for a temperate, prudent bishop other than of of these two.
I actually once had a complete stranger who used to work relatively high up in the diocese of Tyler (I verified this fact) reach out to me on social media because he saw a criticism I’d made of a different church leader who’s less prominent but similar in character to Strickland. He proceeded to kvetch over IM about a range of leadership issues he’d witnessed in Tyler and even though he never explicitly laid any of his complaints at Bishop Strickland’s feet, it wasn’t too difficult to read between the lines and conclude he had problems with the bishop.
This was long before Strickland had been removed from office, so to be perfectly frank I feel pretty confident that there were other problems leading to Strickland’s ouster we likely don’t know much about, and he took an aggressively anti-Francis posture to deflect attention from whatever his leadership failures were and turn himself into a martyr.
That’s all just my musings based on somewhat impromptu social media interactions with a stranger, but as much as I like what Strickland stands for in theory, my takeaway about him is still, as you say, “a loon’s a loon.”
Please no. We have some excellent priests in the Charlotte diocese who would merit a promotion before bringing in another outside guy with a talent for attracting negative nationwide attention.
While I admire zeal - Bishop Strickland said Mass with a known Sedecantist recently (a “friend” of the Pillar). There were most definitely reasons beyond politics he was removed from Tyler.
I thought this rare species of bishop, very common in the 1970's and 1980's, the Cardinal Bernardin/Mahoney species, had gone extinct. Bishop Martin is very backwards and has to learn that we are living in the era of Cardinals Cupich, Tobin, and McElroy, the "undermine the morals of the faithful by promoting perversion and theological heresy, but let them enjoy their liturgy"-sort of bishop. The "tear down the altar rails" Bishop Martin is probably not even liked by the liberals in the Vatican, who have learned that those types of policies lead to counter-revolution by the faithful in the pews, and therefore are counterproductive in leading souls to Hell. Now that Archbishop Paglia has retired from the Pontifical Academy for Life, maybe he should travel to North Carolina along with the Jesuit Father Martin to teach Bishop Martin how to effectively undermine the morals of the faithful in his diocese rather than ticking them off by messing up their liturgy.
It was Cupich and James Martin who propelled Bishop Martin into his office. I think his policies are very much in line with their sensibilities, even if he is much less politically adept at implementing them.
I think Cardinal Cupich is the most destructive bishop in United States history, but he has never implemented stupid diocesan-wide policies like Bishop Martin. I attend Mass in the Archdiocese of Chicago and there are several parishes with Novus Ordo Masses where all the faithful receive Communion on the tongue at altar rails, where only altar boys can serve, where Communion is given only under one species, where only priests distribute Communion, etc. Cupich undermines the Faith by closing down beautiful churches, by downgrading or harassing good pastors, by kicking out conservative religious orders from diocesan owned or controlled property, by expelling solid seminarians, by promoting heretics and careerists, by supporting heretical teaching in Catholic schools, universities and seminaries, by terrorizing the priests in his archdiocese. He has eliminated the Traditional Latin Mass from being celebrated on the first Sunday of each month and basically exiled the Institute of Christ the Sovereign Priest from the Archdiocese (he let them keep their shrine, but they cannot celebrate public Mass there).
But he has also, ironically, continued the Pope Leo XIII Institute at Mundelein Seminary which trains exorcists from various dioceses, designated some of the more conservative parish churches to have Holy Doors with the indulgences associated with the Jubilee Year, and tolerated conservative liturgical practices at some prominent parishes.
That Bishop Martin has gotten in trouble with the Vatican in less than one year of being bishop, while Cupich stealthily advanced in the hierarchy, first in the conservative Archdiocese of Omaha, and then under Pope John Paul II and Pope Benedict XVI as rector of the conservative Pontifical College Josephinum and later Bishop of Rapid City and Spokane tells me Bishop Martin is a rather poor student of Cupich who has now garnered world-wide attention for his incompetence when smart liberals know they have to be sneaky to be successful.
I'm really sorry to hear how Cupich is persecuting the faithful in Chicago. His vicious hatred of traditional Catholics is famous around the country, though we rarely hear the details. I remember how he had Fr. Phillips removed over false abuse allegations, and refused to allow his return even after he was cleared. However, I hadn't heard that he banned the Institute of Christ the King from saying mass. Saddling them with the burden of maintaining a shrine without any income from masses and parish life is particularly cruel. If an ideologue bishop on the right had been half as cruel as Cupich, he would have been called to Rome and told to stop long ago. There is no room in a functional hierarchy for such vicious cruelty toward the faithful.
The recent history of the shrine run by Institute of Christ the King is the reason Cupich has not stripped them of it completely. It was meant to be bulldozed under Cardinal George when it was a closed diocesan church. A group of liberal Aldermen had grew up in that Irish parish in south Chicago and so they made the Church a historical landmark. Since Cardinal George now could not destroy it, he sold it to the Institute, who started major renovations until a fire destroyed even more of the interior, but the Institute started rebuilding it again until Cardinal Cupich shut them down, because they would not celebrate Novus Ordo Masses on first Sundays (the Institute cannot according to their Vatican approved statutes). Since Cupich cannot demolish it and sell it to some secular developer for profit, he left them the property to keep for now. I think they are waiting it out until the next Archbishop, as the shrine is in a good location, near the University of Chicago.
Not long after he arrived, he gave a speech to a group of clergy that was far from encouraging. As I was leaving, there were two guys walking near me I recognized — neither of whom I took for pillars of tradition or conservatism, and whose names I don’t recall; I heard one say to the other, “Let’s not wait; let’s start hating him now.”
Some priests in Chicago were hoping Pope Francis would assign Cupich to the Vatican in order, as one priest told me, "so he can stop torturing us."
All abusive fathers die. Let's hope Cupich's replacement is a more loving person and that the faithful can forgive Cupich for the evil he has done.
“but [Cardinal Cupich] has never implemented stupid diocesan-wide policies like Bishop Martin”
(Bishop Martin didn’t implement these policies either)
But he wants to with a very comprehensive plan. Cardinal Cupich has been Archbishop of Chicago for over 10 years and has not implemented any archdiocesan-wide liturgical restriction except for limitations on the TLM.
I thought he was restricting altar rails and communion on the tongue.
Cupich has told priests not to put a kneeler in front of the Communion line, but that has not been universally followed and it has not affected altar rails. I know of at least 5 parishes where at Novus Ordo Masses Communion is distributed to nearly everyone or everyone kneeling and on the tongue. Those are the ones I personally know of, but I am sure there are more. I will not name them because of the liberal snitches and spies who also read the Pillar.
What do you mean by expelling solid seminarians?
I mean that there are many seminarians at Mundelein Seminary that had to leave, including one who I met wearing a cassock at a charity gala who I complemented for wearing the cassock and who told me to pray for him because the diocese was reviewing him for being too conservative. The next year he was not on the list of seminarians. One priest had his priestly ordination delayed for one year so he could be monitored because of his traditional liturgical tendencies. The Archdiocese had on average 10 ordinations a year under Cardinal George. This year, two priests were ordained, last year 3 were ordained, but one of them each year was from the Canons Regular of St. John Cantius, a traditionalist religious order under the Archbishop of Chicago. These Canons are tolerated by Cupich because they bring in a lot of money for the Diocesan Appeal and have prominent, wealthy supporters, but even though there are nearly 20 priests in this order, they only run two parishes in the Archdiocese assigned to them by Cardinal George.
That is not good. But how conservative is too conservative?Are these guys Bishop Barron or Cardinal O’Mallet types or are they closer to a cardinal Burke type? Are they seeking other dioceses?
None of the men you mentioned are heretical or schismatic in any way. Just the opposite, they're more loyal to the Church and HF than Jimmy Martin S.J.
None of the ones I know of who left were regularly participating in the TLM. I will defer to Cranberry Chuck for the rest of my reply.
Cardinal Burke is a priest in good standing, and though his style might not be to your liking, he’s not an extremist or schismatic like Vigano or Fr. Altman
That’s interesting, I haven’t seen that reported yet. What’s the connection between Cupich and Martin?
Danny who replied to my first comment said there was, and I don't know enough to say there is not. Cardinal Cupich is on the Dicastry for Bishops which usually chooses new bishops (unless the Pope decides to name a bishop without their recommendation), so I am sure he was at least partially involved with Bishop Martin's nomination.
I wonder why he is in such a rush? I used to live in that diocese. I can do nothing but pray for Bishop Martin and the Catholics in the Diocese of Charlotte.
Like so many bishops, he seems to think he has a mandate from God to install his personal vision i the diocese. Why else was he chosen? Seems he spent too much time teaching/administrating than being a shepherd in his career. And zero experience running a large multi-faceted organization like a diocese. 12 years at Duke as a chaplain is not suitable experience to leanr to govern a large organization like this diocese. This is why it is a mistake to make someone a bishop then put them in charge of a large diocese rather than making them an auxiliary bishop first. This poor fella is ill-equipped for the job due to lack of training -- not his fault.
Tbh, I wonder what sort of chaplain he was at Duke. He seems to have all the pastoral gifts of a bulldozer.
I wonder if his experience as a chaplain at Duke shaped him in a way that makes him feel that his current actions are permissible and even desired. I’ve been to several Catholic/Newman centers, and generally they have a more emotive and less traditional vibe, much more focused on community than liturgy. From my personal experience, it wasn’t until after college that I truly desired more traditional liturgy. I felt that I was in a new phase of life, and the “college liturgy” no longer meant as much, particularly as I couldn’t relate as much to the college kids even a few years out of college. Perhaps the Bishop misunderstands the enthusiasm of college kids in a more communal atmosphere and feels he can broaden it to the whole diocese, without understanding that different parishioners are in different periods of life and seek different things.
Additionally, college kids seem to rarely oppose authority figures and their instructions, perhaps he was unprepared for such pushback, as I doubt this pushback would happen at Duke. This may lead to an “I know best” mentality, and ironically make him less “synodal”, as he has had little experience with parishes with more diverse populations.
It always seems to me that campus ministry-assigned priests, for good or ill, sink into the habit of “imprinting” their preferences, outlooks, and personalities on the very malleable young adults “finding themselves” in college. I tend to find this problematic even when dealing with very good priests, but even more so when it’s a more troublesome priest.
My intuition here is that Bishop Martin is accustomed to, and rather likes and insists upon, the notion that he’s some kind of charismatic and transformative leader and doesn’t realize that it’s just a by-product of the kind of people he’d previously been called to pastor.
It’s healthy for bishops to learn they’re about 40% “leaders” and about 60% “servants,” which is quite an inversion of how campus ministry chaplains get to operate.
That makes tons of sense.
Seems more like a temperament problem. Experience might round off some edges, but experience teaches that the fundamental personality will remain, and remain problematic.
The arrogance of Bishop Martin is astounding.
In January, he received an open letter respectfully asking him to slow down his pace of change in the diocese, in April he has a meeting with Bishop Prevost encouraging him to do the same.
In May, despite the council of now Pope Leo, he pushes forward with decisions about the location of the cathedral, and "liturgical reforms" that are unnecessary and unpopular.
Unbelievable.
I’m noticing a trend: it seems as certain parts of the Church distance themselves from orthodoxy, they end up decreasing the diversity that is welcome in the Church. Rather than a beautiful symphony of parts, the result is a forced monotony of Church practice. Or, in the case of Germany, a frantic mishmash of behaviors that are so far off in left field. The extremes have become more pronounced.
Hot take: converting a parish into a cathedral is an abusive practice that should only be done 1) as a last resort and 2) after getting the eager consent of the parishioners.
To be fair, it is not without reason. St. Mark's as a parish is already very large and influential. I think it may be the largest parish in the Diocese (fact check needed). And it is not so far outside of the city of Charlotte. There is also precedent to converting a parish into a cathedral (sometimes a "co-cathedral).
In the neighboring Diocese of Raleigh, Bishop Burbidge built a new cathedral (the former cathedral sits around 250; new one closer to 2500). This was ultimately a very good decision, but it came with a lot of challenges. Many people decried the project as a waste of money, etc. So a Bishop can never please everybody.
That's just some counter points to consider. But at the end of the day, I think Charlotte ought to build a new cathedral; hopefully something beautiful and long-lasting.
The fact that the parish is large just means doing spiritual damage to more people in the process.
Yes, there will always people who will say the perfume should be sold and the money given to the poor. If a bishop is really worried about these people, he can just stay where he is.
It would be one thing if there bishop were forced out his cathedral, such as by arson (see Madison WI). But this is the bishop choosing to relocate.
Actually, the decision that a new cathedral was needed was not made by Bishop Martin, but by his predecessor, Bishop Jugis (who is widely lauded as traditional) and by diocesan planning. +Martin has inherited that decision.
Also, the idea is totally bizarre that being named a Cathedral spiritually damages a group of people. Why would that be the case?
The point is that there is a working—if inconvenient—cathedral. This is very different from circumstances where a cathedral needs to be named because none exists. Hence, this is a voluntary choice. Most people appreciate that the diocese would benefit from having a larger cathedral; that aspect is not particularly controversial. The controversy is how to get a larger cathedral, and the successor is not ipso facto bound my the decisions of his predecessor.
On contrary, it is entirely bizarre to think that being named a cathedral would cause no spiritual damage to the parish community. It radically disrupts the parish life, changes the use and availability or resources, fundamentally alters the relationship between the people and the leadership of the parish, and creates new completion between local and diocesan priorities. Changing pastors can be damaging enough as it is, but at least the new pastor is focused on that community. But a bishop and all that comes with him is a massive sea change, and one that doesn’t have the best interests of that local community as its focus.