‘Grow spiritually’
Deacon David Reiser’s faith journey has taken him all over the world. He is shown assisting at Our Lady of the Assumption Church.CHARLOTTE — As Deacon David Reiser celebrates 15 years of serving as a deacon, he also looks back on a life filled with many interwoven journeys that combined to bring him to where he is today – including a nudge from a future saint.
“15 years went fast – I stayed busy,” he said recently from an office at Our Lady of the Assumption Church off Shamrock Drive, where he served as business manager until December 2025 in addition to being deacon.
His secular career – 40 years of experience in law enforcement, crisis response and aviation – alone could spark hours of stories.
A former police officer in Illinois, he joined the Federal Bureau of Investigation where he worked as a special agent and pilot, with postings in Detroit, Minneapolis, Charlotte, Puerto Rico and Quantico, Virginia.
Roots in Israel
But his journey of faith began in Israel, where he was born to a Jewish family who moved to the United States when he was in his teens. While living in Israel, he visited sites around the Holy Land.
“A curiosity was always there – something about the Holy Spirit,” he says. “When we moved to the U.S., we lived in New York, and all my neighbors were either Jewish or Catholic, and through curiosity I looked into the Scriptures and the prophets.”
His love of flying later led to pursuing an aviation degree at the Jesuit-run St. Louis University, where he was invited to a nondenominational Christian service on Palm Sunday in 1977.
“I realized that this prophet named Jesus Christ was the Messiah and I accepted Christ,” he says.
He attended nondenominational and Baptist churches for several years until a conflict with a pastor kept him away.
Finding God – and a wife
Years later, while posted in San Juan with the FBI, he met a Catholic woman named Maria who invited him to attend Mass with her. In the celebration of the Eucharist, he recognized its ties to the Passover meals celebrated with his Jewish family – and all his studies and curiosity came together.
“The first time I went to Mass, I knew that I was home,” he says. The woman who took him to Mass later became his wife. They have three children and five grandchildren.
An FBI posting in Charlotte led him to attend Mass first at St. Patrick Cathedral and then at Our Lady of the Assumption in Charlotte, where he went through what was then the RCIA program.
He became Catholic in 1993.
He was later inspired to serve the Church by two deacons he knew, as well as from St. Teresa of Calcutta, whom he met when he served on her security detail during her 1995 visit to Charlotte.
“She talked to my wife and to me, and she asked me to tell her about my faith,” he says. “She said, ‘Continue to pursue your faith and grow spiritually.’”
He took her words to heart and was ordained as a deacon in 2011.
Since then, he has faithfully served at Our Lady of the Assumption – helping to run faith formation classes and other ministries at the increasingly diverse parish.
He has witnessed the dramatic growth of the Hispanic community and an infusion of immigrants from Myanmar (formerly Burma) and other nations. His fluency in Spanish has helped his ministry.
“I’m proud of just growing with the growth of the Church and being able to help people,” he says.
His Jewish background has also helped, he says. “I have a much deeper understanding of the Old Testament, the words of the prophets and how that leads into the New Testament and points to Christ. It’s a much clearer point of reference I sometimes use in my preaching.”
Airport journeys
Deacon Reiser in his role as executive director of Interfaith Chaplaincy at Charlotte Douglas International Airport.Deacon Reiser also offers the love of Christ to the thousands who travel daily through Charlotte-Douglas International Airport in his role as executive director of Inter-Faith Chaplaincy, a role he assumed in 2021.
Through the ministry, volunteers pray or talk with travelers facing crises such as death or illness or just dealing with difficult times. In 15 years of airport ministry, he’s dealt with everything from immigrant families who were stranded in Charlotte to three traveler deaths, including two people who died on planes and one in the terminal itself.
“It’s a ministry of presence – we don’t proselytize,” he says. “Someone might ask if we can pray together, or they just might want to talk because their mother is dying or they’re having problems with their children. Day to day, you don’t know what you’re going to run into.”
Overall, he says his 15 years of ministry have been guided by the voice he first heard on his explorations as a child in the Holy Land.
“It’s the Holy Spirit – it really is. If you’re open to the Holy Spirit, you’re going to recognize that Jesus Christ is the One who came to redeem us.”
— Christina Lee Knauss
