Before he arrived in South Bend, Notre Dame Fighting Irish head coach Marcus Freeman was not himself part of the Catholic faith, even though Notre Dame is a private, Catholic university. But less than a year after becoming the head coach at Notre Dame, he has converted.
Back in 2022, weekly bulletin of his home parish at St. Pius X Catholic Church showed a photograph of Freeman alongside several key members of Notre Dame’s leadership with the caption indicating that Freeman underwent the conversion process in early September, during which he made his profession of faith, was confirmed, and received his First Holy Communion.
Freeman did not intend for this to get public attention, but he understands that when his job is so public, that happens.
“I tried to keep it as private as I could,” Freeman said according to the South Bend Tribune. “Obviously, when you’re head coach at Notre Dame, nothing is private.”
Freeman was raised in the Protestant Christian and Korean church traditions — his mother, Chong, was born in South Korea — but he said that he learned a lot about the Catholic tradition since coming to Notre Dame.
“I think it was something I really didn’t know much about before I got here,” he said. “And I think you have this perception of what the Catholic faith is: They have this thing called ‘Mass,’ and you have all these different routines that you go to and you participate in.
“But Catholics are Christians, and that’s the best thing about it. You go to Mass — and our entire team goes to Mass, Catholic or not Catholic — and you realize that we are all embracing and believing in Jesus Christ as our savior. That’s important for me. I want our guys to wonder about what it means to embrace Jesus Christ.”
Since converting to Catholicism, Freeman has brought back the Notre Dame tradition of pregame Mass, where the players attend Mass ahead of each game day.
“To me, what better time is there to go have Mass?” Freeman said of the move according to the National Catholic Register. “What better time to be able to really be on the edge of your seat to get every word that comes out of the priest’s mouth and to be as close to God as you can?”
Freeman thinks that the pregame Mass is beneficial to all players, Catholic and non-Catholic alike.
“For me, the mindset (is) really being calm before the storm,” he said. “You can get so riled up before the game and hours before the game. I didn’t want that. As we move forward, I want to make sure those guys are calm, and part of that is making sure we spend some time in reflection in a Mass.
“And then coming over here, when the foot hits the ball at kickoff, we’ll be ready to roll. But I really want to be able to be at peace and be a little bit calm as we get ready to come into the stadium. Embrace this place, and then when it’s kickoff time, we’ll be ready to roll.”
Notre Dame is set to take on the Ohio State Buckeyes in Monday night’s national championship game after a run through the College Football Playoff. That will mean one last time for the players to embrace this “calm before the storm” that Freeman describes.
