Early life Joseph Spalding was born on January 13, 1965, in
Lebanon, Kentucky, and grew up on the family farm in
Washington County, Kentucky. His family has roots in the earliest Catholic presence west of the Appalachian Mountains. His ancestors include Archbishop
Martin Spalding, John Lancaster Spalding and Mother
Catherine Spalding. Joseph Spalding graduated from
Bethlehem High School in Bardstown, Kentucky in 1983. After finishing high school, Spalding decided to become a priest. He enter the
Saint Meinrad Seminary and School of Theology in St. Meinrad, Indiana, where he received a Bachelor of Arts degree in history in 1987. Spalding then traveled to the
Catholic University of Louvain in Leuven, Belgium; he earned a master's degree and a
Bachelor of Sacred Theology degree there in 1990. He was consecrated on February 2, 2018. by Archbishop
Joseph Edward Kurtz, with Archbishop
Christophe Pierre and Cardinal
Justin Rigali serving as co-consecrators. In November 2018, Spalding released a list of 13 diocesan clerics with credible accusations of sexual abuse of minors who served in Tennessee from the 1940s through the 1990s. Spalding in January 2024 removed Reverend Juan Carlos Garcia from his position at St. Philip Parish in
Franklin, Tennessee, pending investigation. A teenager in November 2023 had accused Garcia of inappropriate touching. ==See also==