Shelton Fabre
Shelton Joseph Fabre was born October 25, 1963, in New Roads, Louisiana, the fifth of six children. He graduated in 1981 as valedictorian of Catholic High School of Pointe Coupee, then entered Saint Joseph Seminary College (B.A. History, 1985). He completed priestly formation at the American College of Louvain in Belgium, earning bachelor's and master's degrees in religious studies (1987, 1989). He was ordained a priest for the Diocese of Baton Rouge on August 5, 1989.
Fabre was appointed an Auxiliary Bishop of the Archdiocese of New Orleans in 2007, serving until 2013. He then served as the third Bishop of Houma-Thibodaux, Louisiana, from 2013 to 2022. In May 2018 he was elected chairman of the USCCB Ad Hoc Committee Against Racism, and in November 2018 he oversaw the U.S. bishops' pastoral letter against racism, 'Open Wide Our Hearts.'
On February 8, 2022, Pope Francis appointed Fabre the tenth Bishop and fifth Archbishop of the Archdiocese of Louisville, Kentucky. He was installed on March 30, 2022, becoming the first person of color to lead the Archdiocese of Louisville and Kentucky's first Black archbishop. He remains the sitting Archbishop of Louisville as of mid-2026.
On the specific question that matters most to traditional Catholics, Archbishop Fabre's record in Louisville is favorable. He inherited a permissive post-Traditionis Custodes posture (his predecessor, Archbishop Joseph E. Kurtz, had written to priests on August 20, 2021, allowing 1962-Missal Masses to continue at their current locations) and he did not tighten it. The Archdiocese of Louisville has remained a 'no TLM suppressed' jurisdiction throughout Fabre's tenure.
His own decisive act cut in the TLM's favor: on May 18, 2023, Fabre designated St. Martin of Tours in downtown Louisville a diocesan shrine, a status that, in the reporting of the archdiocesan newspaper The Record, will allow it to continue offering Mass in the Extraordinary Form every Sunday at noon. St. Martin of Tours is a diocesan parish, and elevating it to a shrine served precisely to secure its traditional liturgical life rather than curtail it.
Context to keep straight: the FSSP presence in Kentucky (Regina Pacis Chaplaincy serving Lexington and Georgetown) lies in the neighboring Diocese of Lexington, not Fabre's archdiocese; an SSPX chapel operates independently in Louisville outside archdiocesan governance. No public evidence was found of Fabre restricting confirmations, ordinations, or the older sacramental rites, nor of any ad orientem or altar-rail prohibition. On his deeds to date, he is a friend to the traditional Mass; his broader public identity is that of a racism/social-justice-focused prelate, which is why a 'mixed' framing is sometimes applied, but the liturgical record itself points to friend.