Erik T. Pohlmeier
Erik Thomas Pohlmeier was born July 20, 1971, in Colorado Springs, Colorado, and raised in Paris, Arkansas, the son of Deacon Tom and Sharon Pohlmeier. He studied mechanical engineering at the University of Arkansas before entering seminary, earning a philosophy degree from St. Meinrad College (1994), a Bachelor of Sacred Theology from the Gregorian University in Rome (1997), and a licentiate in spiritual theology from the Angelicum (1998). He was ordained a priest for the Diocese of Little Rock on July 25, 1998.
Pohlmeier served the Diocese of Little Rock, Arkansas, for 24 years as a priest, working as associate pastor and pastor in multiple (often rural and Spanish-speaking) parishes and as diocesan director of faith formation. From 2020 to 2022 he was pastor of Christ the King, Little Rock, the diocese's largest parish. Pope Francis appointed him Bishop of St. Augustine on May 15, 2022, and he was ordained and installed as the 11th Bishop of St. Augustine on July 22, 2022. His episcopal motto is 'Seek First the Kingdom of God.'
As Bishop of St. Augustine, Pohlmeier's public emphasis has been Eucharistic renewal, catechesis, and one-on-one evangelization. He chairs the USCCB Subcommittee on the Catechism. He inherited from his predecessor a diocese that had just implemented Traditionis Custodes; his own subsequent handling of the Traditional Latin Mass has been comparatively supportive within those constraints.
The crux is Traditionis Custodes, and here the record clearly distinguishes Pohlmeier from his predecessor. The suppression of the beloved Basilica of the Immaculate Conception Latin Mass in Jacksonville was decreed by Bishop Felipe J. Estevez on May 18, 2022, taking effect June 29, 2022 -- before Pohlmeier was installed on July 22, 2022. The harshest act on the record belongs to the man Pohlmeier replaced, not to Pohlmeier.
What Pohlmeier himself has done points the other way. On May 23, 2023 he formally appointed Father Christopher Liguori as his diocesan delegate for the 1962 Missal (a three-year term), and under his authority a stable of diocesan priests were trained in the Tridentine rite. The Traditional Latin Mass continues at St. Joseph's Historic Church in Jacksonville with two Sunday Masses -- a Low Mass and a High Mass -- served by a schola and multiple priests. Relative to many bishops in the TC era, appointing a delegate and investing in training priests is an act of preservation, not hostility.
The record is not unmixed: the TLM remains confined to a single designated (non-parochial) church under TC's framework, no traditional order (FSSP/ICKSP) has been invited in, the Starke Latin Mass lapsed in June 2024 when its Vatican dispensation expired, and Pohlmeier has made no public championing of the old rite -- his stated priorities are Eucharistic revival and one-on-one evangelization. But on deeds, within the cage TC built, he has stabilized and supported the traditional community rather than strangling it. That earns a cautious, deeds-based friendship, watchful for how the delegate term and the St. Joseph's arrangement fare going forward.