The Archdiocese of Louisville () is an archdiocese of the Catholic Church in central Kentucky in the United States. The cathedral church of the archdiocese is the Cathedral of the Assumption in Louisville. The archdiocese is the seat of the metropolitan see of the province of Louisville, which encompasses the states of Kentucky and Tennessee. It is the second-oldest diocese west of the Appalachian Mountains. The archbishop is Shelton Fabre.
Territory The Archdiocese of Louisville consists of these 24 counties in central Kentucky: Adair, Barren, Bullitt, Casey, Clinton, Cumberland, Green, Hardin, Hart, Henry, Jefferson, Larue, Marion, Meade, Metcalfe, Monroe, Nelson, Oldham, Russell, Shelby, Spencer, Taylor, Trimble, and Washington counties. The Archdiocese covers .
Statistics As of 2023, the archdiocese had a Catholic population of approximately 200,000. The archdiocese operated 110 parishes and missions staffed by 127 diocesan priests, 131 permanent deacons, 39 religious institute priests, nine extern priests, 61 religious brothers, and 363 religious sisters. The archdiocese had 48 Catholic elementary and high schools serving more than 18,000 students. The archdiocese served more than 233,900 persons in Catholic hospitals, health care centers, homes for the aged, and specialized homes.
History 1700 to 1808 Prior to the American Revolution, present-day Kentucky was part of the British Province of Virginia. To prevent hostility with Native American peoples in the region, the British did not allow European settlers to move west of the Appalachian Mountains. After the Revolution ended in 1781, settlers from the original 13 states, including Catholics, started flooding into the region.
The Vatican in 1784 removed the new United States from the jurisdiction of the Diocese of London, establishing the Prefecture Apostolic of United States of America, a jurisdiction in the United States. The first Catholic presence in Kentucky may have been a group of 25 families who traveled from Maryland in 1785 to Goodwin's Station in present-day Nelson County and founded Holy Cross Church. This was the first church in the present-day archdiocese. Most of the early Catholic settlers in Kentucky were English-Catholics from Maryland.
The Vatican in 1789 elevated the prefecture to the Diocese of Baltimore, the first diocese in the United States, covering the entire nation. The first Catholic church west of the Appalachian Mountains, Holy Cross, was constructed at Pottinger Creek in 1792. In 1792, the Commonwealth of Kentucky was admitted to the union. In 1793, Stephen T. Badin estimated that 300 Catholic families were living in Kentucky, clustered in six settlements around Bardstown. These Catholics had left Maryland due to the religious persecution of Catholics there.
1808 to 1841
In 1808, Pope Pius VII created four new dioceses out of the Diocese of Baltimore. One of these dioceses was the Diocese of Bardstown. The pope chose Bardstown because it already had a significant Catholic population. The new diocese included all of Kentucky along with a vast area of the American Midwest and South, from the Great Lakes to the Gulf Coast, out to the Mississippi River. The pope appointed Benedict Flaget as the first bishop of Bardstown. Flaget resisted the appointment, but Pius VII insisted he take it.
Needing to ordain more priests, Flaget in 1811 started St. Thomas Seminary near Bardstown. It was the first Catholic seminary outside of the original 13 colonies. Flaget started construction of St. Joseph Cathedral in Bardstown in 1816. Many Protestants helped fund its construction as they felt it would increase the area's prestige. Flaget celebrated the first mass at St. Joseph in 1819, although the cathedral was not completed until 1823. Also in 1819, Flaget founded St. Joseph's College in Bardstown.
Over the coming years, the Vatican started reducing the size of the Diocese of Bardstown. It created the Diocese of Cincinnati in 1821.Archdiocese of Cincinnati page on Catholic Hierarchy web site. That same year, William Byrne founded St. Mary's College near Lebanon. Flaget tried to resign as bishop in 1833, but the Vatican forced him to stay in that position.
In 1834, Pope Gregory XVI erected the Diocese of Vincennes. The first German Catholic church in Louisville, St. Boniface, was founded in 1836; it is today the oldest continually operating parish in the city. Three years later, Gregory XVI erected the Diocese of Nashville. With the creation of these new dioceses, the Diocese of Bardstown now included just Kentucky.
To address the shortage of clergy in his diocese, Flaget in 1835 left for Europe, where he would spend the next four years recruiting seminarians to come to Kentucky. During his absence, Coadjutor Bishop Guy Ignatius Chabrat administered the diocese. At this point, Flaget had founded four colleges, a large orphanage and infirmary for girls and eleven academies for girls. He had introduced three congregations of religious sisters and four religious orders of men into the diocese. Flaget returned to Kentucky in 1839.
1841 to 1855
In 1841, recognizing the increased population and importance of Louisville, Gregory XVI suppressed the Diocese of Bardstown and erected the Diocese of Louisville in its place. He designated St. Louis Church in Louisville as its new cathedral. Like the Diocese of Bardstown, the new diocese covered the entire state of Kentucky. Flaget became the first bishop of Louisville.
In 1848, Pope Pius IX appointed Martin Spalding as coadjutor bishop in Louisville to assist Flaget. That same year, 40 Trappists monks purchased 1,600 acres in Nelson County from the Sisters of Loretto. It became Gethsemani Abbey in 1850, the first Trappist monastery in the United States. Seeing the need for a new cathedral, Flaget started construction of the Cathedral of the Assumption in 1849. The new cathedral was built around the older St. Louis Cathedral; workers disassembled the old structure, carrying it out piece by piece through the doors of the new cathedral.
After Flaget's death in 1850, Spalding automatically succeeded him as bishop of Louisville. When Spalding became bishop, the diocese had a Catholic population exceeding 30,000, with 43 churches, ten chapels, and 40 priests. One of his first acts was to visit every parish, school and other Catholic institution in the diocese. He founded an orphanage for boys in 1850. He continued the construction of the Cathedral of the Assumption, dedicating it in 1852.
In 1853, Pope Pius IX erected the Diocese of Covington, taking Eastern Kentucky from the Diocese of Louisville. By the late 19th century, large numbers of German and Irish Catholic immigrants were arriving in Louisville.
1855 to 1910
In 1855, an anti-Catholic riot, later known as Bloody Monday, erupted in Louisville. As an election approached in August 1885, tensions were rising in the city. Opponents of the Democratic Party and supporters of the anti-Catholic Know Nothing movement were spreading rumors. They claimed that immigrant Catholics were planning to overthrow the US Government and that Spalding was hiding weapons for this insurrection in his churches. On election day, rioters attacked German Catholics as they arrived at polling stations. Mobs then started burning homes in an Irish neighborhood. Louisville Mayor John Barbee, himself a member of the Know Nothing Party, saved the Cathedral of the Assumption from destruction during the riot.
Between 22 and 100 Catholics were killed before the Bloody Monday riot was suppressed. Following the riot, Spalding wrote, "I entreat all to pause and reflect, to commit no violence, to believe no idle rumors, and to cultivate that peace and love which are characteristics of the religion of Christ." In 1861, after the start of the American Civil War, Spalding closed St. Joseph's College and converted its facilities into a military hospital for soldiers. In 1864, Spalding became archbishop of Baltimore.
To replace Spalding, Pius IX named Peter Lavialle in 1865 as the next bishop of Louisville. During his two-year tenure, Lavialle conducted diocesan visitations, invited the Dominican Fathers to the diocese and erected four churches in Louisville. Lavialle died in 1867.
1868 to 1937
William McCloskey, rector of the Pontifical North American College in Rome, was appointed bishop of Louisville in 1868 by Pius IX. When McCloskey took office, the diocese had 64 churches. He introduced the Passionists, the Benedictines, the Fathers of the Resurrection, the Little Sisters of the Poor, the Franciscan Sisters, and the Brothers of Mary into the diocese to run schools and staff institutions. In 1869, McCloskey brought the Sisters of Mercy to Louisville to operate the U.S. Marine Hospital. That same year, he established Preston Park Seminary in Louisville. When McCloskey died in 1909, the diocese had 165 churches.
After McCloskey died in 1909, Auxiliary Bishop Denis O'Donaghue from the Diocese of Indianapolis was the next bishop. During the 1918 influenza pandemic, O'Donaghue closed the diocese's churches. He stated "the civil laws of the community always take precedence over the laws of the church." For his efforts and those of the religious sisters and Knights of Columbus in Louisville during the pandemic, General Fred Thaddeus Austin of Camp Zachary Taylor wrote him a public letter of gratitude. The Sisters of Charity opened Nazareth College in Louisville in 1920, the first four-year Catholic college in the archdiocese for women. It is today Spalding University.
In 1923, the Vatican appointed John A. Floersh of Nashville as coadjutor bishop in the diocese to assist O'Donoghue. When O'Donoghue died in 1924, Floersh became bishop of Louisville. In 1931, the Dominican Sisters founded St. Catharine Junior College at Springfield.
1937 to 1981
On December 9, 1937, Pope Pius XI elevated the Diocese of Louisville to the Archdiocese of Louisville. At the same time, the pope erected the Diocese of Owensboro, taking western Kentucky from the new archdiocese. The Dioceses of Covington, Owensboro, and Nashville were now designated as suffragan dioceses of the archdiocese. The pope named Floersh as the first archbishop of Louisville. In 1941, Floersh criticized The Courier-Journal in Louisville for featuring a full-page advertisement for birth control devices.
During his tenure as bishop and archbishop, Floersh increased the number of parishes and schools in the archdiocese. He established Bellarmine College in 1950 in Louisville; it is today Bellarmine University. Floresch also established the local Catholic Charities agency, the annual Corpus Christi processions, and St. Thomas Seminary in Louisville in 1952. He also called on Kentucky Catholics to support the American civil rights movement. Floersh retired in 1967.
The second archbishop of Louisville was Bishop Thomas J. McDonough from the Diocese of Savannah, named by Pope Paul VI in 1967. A self-described "Vatican II bishop", McDonough implemented the Second Vatican Council's reforms in the archdiocese. His tenure saw advances in liturgical renewal, ecumenism, and lay involvement. In 1970, Paul VI erected the Diocese of Memphis, making it another suffragan of the Archdiocese of Louisville. McDonough retired in 1981.
1981 to present
In 1981, Pope John Paul II appointed Auxiliary Bishop Thomas C. Kelly from the Archdiocese of Washington as the next archbishop of Louisville. Kelly led the restoration of the Cathedral of the Assumption in Louisville, pushed for interfaith dialogue, and worked for increased lay person leadership in the archdiocese. He started a Campaign for Excellence program that reversed the enrollment decline at Catholic schools in the archdiocese. Kelly admitted to developing an opioid addiction while recovering from surgery for lung cancer, only recognizing the problem after being confronted by his doctors.