Alfred Andrew Schlert
Alfred Andrew Schlert was born July 24, 1961, in Easton, Pennsylvania. He attended Notre Dame High School in Easton, then entered St. Charles Borromeo Seminary in Philadelphia before completing priestly formation in Rome at the Pontifical Roman Seminary and the Pontifical Lateran University. He was ordained a priest for the Diocese of Allentown on September 19, 1987, and earned a Licentiate in Canon Law from the Lateran in 1992.
His early ministry included service as a parochial vicar, teaching at Notre Dame High School, and Catholic chaplain at Lehigh University. He was named Vice Chancellor in 1997 and Vicar General of the Diocese in 1998, and from 2008 served as pastor of St. Theresa of the Child Jesus Church in Hellertown. His Rome training, canon-law background, and long chancery service mark him as a churchman of conventional-conservative, institution-minded formation.
Pope Francis appointed him the Fifth Bishop of Allentown on June 27, 2017; he was ordained and installed on August 31, 2017, the first priest ordained for the Diocese of Allentown to become its bishop. His episcopal motto is 'Pasce Oves Meas' (Feed My Sheep). As of mid-2026 he continues to govern the diocese (78 parishes): he issued clergy assignments effective June 2026 and opened a 65th-anniversary 'Eucharistic and Marian Year of Grace' running January 28, 2026 to January 28, 2027.
The Diocese of Allentown is genuinely traditional-friendly, and the deeds under Bishop Schlert bear this out. The Priestly Fraternity of St. Peter has run a flourishing apostolate in the diocese since 2016 (invited by Schlert's predecessor, Bishop John Barres). That apostolate did not merely survive Pope Francis's 2021 motu proprio Traditionis Custodes under Schlert; it was consolidated and strengthened. On Pentecost Sunday, May 28, 2023, it was announced that St. Stephen of Hungary Parish in Allentown would be merged into Holy Ghost Parish in South Bethlehem; the merger took effect June 20, 2023, with Fr. Gregory Pendergraft, FSSP, as pastor. The traditional community thereby gained a full, dedicated parish staffed by FSSP priests offering the Traditional Latin Mass and all the sacraments in the older rite.
This is the decisive point for a deeds-based verdict. Traditionis Custodes barred the old Mass from parochial churches and directed bishops to restrict traditional groups; many bishops used it to suppress, relocate, or cap the TLM. Schlert did the opposite in substance, keeping a robust FSSP presence and giving it institutional footing rather than eliminating it. Reporting at the time placed Allentown among the more permissive dioceses, indicating that priests already offering the traditional Mass could continue.
Schlert's broader profile reinforces the picture: Rome-trained, canon-law credentialed, orthodox and Eucharist-centered (a Year of the Real Presence in 2021-2022 and a Eucharistic and Marian Year of Grace in 2026). No public evidence shows him imposing restrictive rules against ad orientem worship, altar rails, or traditional sacramental practice; the FSSP parish administers the sacraments in the traditional rite without impediment. On the record of actual deeds, Schlert is a friend of Tradition -- one who preserved and even bolstered the old Mass in a period when many of his brother bishops curtailed it.