This week I was at the pastoral center of the Archdiocese of Louisville and saw this map of the diocese of Bardstown (Kentucky), the first diocese established west of the Appalachian Mountains. It extended from the present Georgia border to Canada and from the Pennsylvania border to the Oklahoma border. Bishop Benedict Joseph Flaget, a missionary from France, was the first bishop and moved the diocese from Bardstown to Louisville in 1841. Coming from France to the American mid West was a daunting mission assignment!