New Figures: More Faithful, Fewer Vocations
The number of Catholics increased worldwide, from 1.376 billion in 2021 to 1.390 billion in 2022, with a relative increase of 1.0%. The increase is mainly in Africa: 3% (!), where the number of Catholics rose from 265 to 273 million.
Europe shows a situation of stability: in 2021/2022 there were 286 million Catholics [at least on paper]. The Americas and Asia showed a slight increase: +0.9% and +0.6% respectively.
The number of Catholic priests in the world fell slightly from 407,872 to 407,730, while Africa saw an increase of 3.2%.
The number of priests in Europe decreased by 1.7%. The number of men in religious orders also fell slightly, from 49,774 to 49,414.
The decline in the number of sisters was more dramatic: from 608,958 professed women in 2021 to 599,228, a decrease of 1.6%.
Worldwide, the number of seminarians decreased by 1.3%, with a sharp decrease of 6% in Europe.
Picture: © Mazur/cbcew.org.uk, CC BY-NC-ND, #newsYqjgbfvikk
