Parishioners Report Suspicious Activity Near Latin Mass Church After FBI Memo On

Two parishioners in Northern Virginia said that they saw men in two vehicles acting suspiciously in the parking lot of their Latin Mass Catholic church a few weeks after the FBI’s Richmond Office published an internal memo regarding “radical-traditional Catholics.”

In an exclusive report with The Daily Signal, two parishioners from the Immaculate Heart of Mary Chapel in Linden, Virginia, told the outlet they saw men in two cars surveilling the church parking lot as if they were writing down license plate numbers.

“I suspect that it was the FBI,” one witness told the outlet. “However, I could not confirm since he never got out of the car.”

Last month, FBI whistleblower Kyle Seraphin published a leaked document from the bureau’s Richmond Field Office that explicitly points to “racially or ethnically motivated violent extremists in radical-traditionalist Catholic ideology.” Through tripwires and liaisons, which are trusted contacts, Seraphin noted, the FBI can employ threat mitigation against such groups ahead of the next election.

The document, which relied on ideologically driven criteria from Left-wing sources like the Southern Poverty Law Center, drew attention to the so-called Radical-Traditional Catholic. Authorities described the targeted group as someone who rejects the Second Vatican Council as a valid church council, shows disdain for most of the popes elected since Vatican II, and frequently adheres to anti-Semitic, anti-immigrant, anti-LGBTQ, and white supremacy views.

Following the leak of the unclassified intelligence document, FBI authorities purged its system and began reviewing the basis for it.

The memo included the Society of Saint Pius X, which supports Latin Mass and is affiliated with the Sacred Heart of Mary Chapel.

One parishioner from the church described witnessing a black Ford car with dark tinted windows, a knoblike antenna, and a laptop in the center front driving slowly by the vehicles in the parking lot, according to The Daily Signal.

CLICK HERE TO GET THE DAILYWIRE+ APP

“I could not see the person inside, and no one ever got out,” the source told the outlet. “They did leave as soon as they saw me looking at them.”

The other source described witnessing a suspected male in a white Chevrolet Tahoe with similar features.

“He never got out of the car, but by the time I saw him, he was on his way out and drove back towards the highway after pulling through,” the second parishioner said. “Not sure how long he was out there, as we were all inside. Everyone else was still inside the chapel, so he must have been going around while we were all inside at Mass/catechism.”

A spokesperson from the bureau’s national office in Washington, D.C, denied any knowledge of the situation in a statement to The Daily Signal.

“The Washington Field Office is not aware of that activity,” the spokesperson said.

Faith-based advocacy group CatholicVote filed a lawsuit against the Justice Department and FBI last week for failing to provide a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request related to a leaked memo from the bureau targeting “Radical Traditional Catholics.”

Rep. Jim Jordan (R-OH) said last month that internal documents released by House Judiciary Committee showed at least one undercover FBI employee sought to monitor parishioners in Catholic houses of worship to combat domestic terrorism using tripwire and sources.

The FBI told The Daily Wire the agency received the subpoena, adding the bureau “recognizes the importance of congressional oversight and remains fully committed to cooperating with Congress’s oversight requests consistent with its constitutional and statutory responsibilities.”

“The FBI is actively working to respond to congressional requests for information – including voluntary production of documents,” a spokesperson told The Daily Wire.