Biography

Bishop Michael T. Martin, OFM Conv., was born on Dec. 2, 1961, in Baltimore, Maryland, the only boy of four children in a Catholic family whose faith was an integral part of their lives.

He attended Archbishop Curley High School in Baltimore, where he would later return to work. In 1979, when he was 17, he entered the Conventual Franciscan Friars Novitiate in Ellicott City, Maryland. He graduated with a bachelor’s degree in philosophy from St. Hyacinth College-Seminary (Massachusetts), earned a Bachelor of Sacred Theology from the Pontifical University of St. Bonaventure (Rome), and received a master’s degree in education from Boston College.

He worked as a religious studies teacher and coach at St. Francis High School in Athol Springs, New York, in 1984-1985, then served as a transitional deacon at St. Adalbert Parish in Elmhurst, New York, in 1988-1989.

He was ordained to the priesthood on June 10, 1989, by then Auxiliary Bishop John Ricard of the Archdiocese of Baltimore.

Following ordination, he returned to St. Francis High School to serve as admissions director and as a teacher and coach, from 1989 to 1994. He then served in several positions at his alma mater Archbishop Curley High School from 1994 to 2010 – including president, principal, admissions director, and teacher and basketball coach.

In 2007 he was the recipient of the Pro Ecclesia et Pontifice award from then-Pope Benedict XVI for his service to the Church.

He is no stranger to North Carolina, having served as director of the Duke Catholic Center – the official Catholic community at Duke University in Durham – from 2010 to 2022.

He has also held a number of leadership positions in the Church, particularly in Catholic education. He has served on multiple Catholic school boards including Cardinal Gibbons High School in Raleigh, and worked with Partners in Mission, a Boston-based consulting firm that partners with Catholic schools and institutions to advance the mission of Catholic education.

In 2022, his order assigned him to ministry in the Archdiocese of Atlanta, where he served as pastor of St. Philip Benizi Parish in Jonesboro, Georgia, until his episcopal appointment by Pope Francis on April 9, 2024.

On May 29, 2024, he was ordained to the episcopate by the Most Rev. Gregory J. Hartmayer, OFM Conv., Archbishop of Atlanta, and on May 30, 2024, he was installed as the fifth Bishop of Charlotte, succeeding the Most Rev. Peter J. Jugis.