For Charlotte’s Catholic bishop, just believing isn’t enough

Bishop Michael Martin of the Catholic Diocese of Charlotte this month unveiled his vision for the church with an emphasis on evangelism. The vision, centered on spreading the gospel to others, comes at a moment when church apathy and disaffiliation is on the rise across the nation, Martin said.

“Everyone so loves Jesus, we share Him with others,” is the slogan to describe Martin’s vision as he marks nearly two years as leader of the Catholic diocese for western North Carolina.

Evangelism, while a core facet of Catholicism, is something many Catholics have not been great at, Martin said during a visit to The Charlotte Observer. But in recent years there has been a greater emphasis on evangelism across the church — thanks to pushes from Pope Francis, Pope Leo and others before them.

“We’ve tended to be a little more timid,” Martin said of Catholics. “... We can’t just assume everyone’s heard the good news or everyone’s experienced the good news, and so we’ve got to take the responsibility to say we should be sharing it.”

Three-pronged vision

To support his vision of reaching more people with the Gospel, Martin’s vision announced Feb. 14-15 invites parishioners to live it out through three steps: Forming missionary disciples, becoming the family of God, and going out and proclaiming the gospel.

Martin said while the Catholic Church has done a good job of making believers, it hasn’t been as effective in forming disciples. The difference, as he describes it, is between being a fan of the Carolina Panthers versus being a player on the team.

“Those two things are vastly different. And too often, in the life of faith, we stay on the level of fandom, and we never get down on the field and actually engage in the game of life,” Martin said. “As someone who’s part of that team (I’m) giving my body, soul, spirit, all that I have to it. And so trying to form our folks in that sense of being a disciple. I sit at the feet of Jesus. I listen to him, I admire him, I love him, I adore him, I worship him, and I learn from him such that I’m transformed by it. So getting people to move from mere believers to real disciples is integral, because without that, my love of the Lord is going to be tepid at best.”

Becoming the family of God centers on faith starting in parishioners’ homes and extending to their broader community and not allowing church to become a transactional experience.

“I think a lot of times we invert it. We go to church to kind of get something and bring it home,” Martin said. “That’s nice, and that can be the case, but I think it really should start at home, and that’s what we bring to our houses of worship.”

Lastly “Go out and proclaim the gospel” encourages church members to live out evangelism with an understanding of why they are doing so.

For instance, helping the poor by providing them with roofs over their heads, health care, food and more is great, but Catholics aren’t doing it just because it’s the right thing to do.

“We do it because Jesus calls us to do it and so our intentionality is much different,” he said. “I can’t have this great gift of God’s love in my life and not share with you.”

Apathy amid growth

As he unveiled his vision, Martin acknowledged a growing sense of apathy occurring alongside massive growth in the church.

Last year, the Diocese of Charlotte saw baptisms jump 70%. But that stands alongside other alarming figures — two-thirds of Catholics don’t regularly practice their faith, Martin said in his video announcement of the vision.

Pews across the diocese’s 93 parishes are full, Martin said, but that can mask the realities of church disaffiliation. While some of the growth may be attributed to a feeling of being called spiritually, much of it has to do with Charlotte’s demographics.

“We’re part of the lucky migration club. You know, there are just 100 to 150 people moving to the city every day,” he said. “I could make a church work with that kind of growth. But we’ll be in the same space as places in the northeast, you know, should those demographics shift, unless we are more responsive to our true calling.”

This story was originally published February 26, 2026 at 5:01 AM.