About Arlington, Virginia:
Located just outside…and in view of… Washington, D.C., Arlington is a popular vacation destination and is home to the Pentagon and Arlington National Cemetery.
About the Diocese of Arlington, Virginia:
Jesuit Father Juan Baptista de Segura and companions arrived here in 1570, but were brutally killed in the Virginia wilderness near what is now Williamsburg. It was not until 1647 that Catholicism in Virginia was revived when Governor Giles Brent of Maryland and his sister Margaret maintained the first Catholic settlement in Virginia as one that embraced religious tolerance.
Virginia became known as “The Old Dominion” when the term was coined by King Charles II due Virginia’s loyalty to the crown during the English Civil War fought from 1642 to 1651.
In 1785 Thomas Jefferson’s Act for Establishing Religious Freedom decreed that Catholics were free to worship openly in the Old Dominion, removing all doubt of religious freedom and The Church began to grow in the area.
Catholic places of interest in Arlington, Virginia:
Cathedral of Saint Thomas More