New Statistics Show the Church in Austria Faces Growing Secularization
On January 9, 2018, the Austrian Bishops’ Conference published the first statistics on the life of the Church in 2017 on its website; these statistics show a stable number of Catholics, but also a growing secularization in the country.
On December 31, 2017, there were 5.11 million Catholics in the country, a stable number although it is slightly lower than the 5.16 million recorded in 2016.
53,510 people formally left the Catholic Church in 2017: this is the lowest number since 2012. Is this the end of the upward trend that has been increasing over the past five years?
5,364 people asked to enter – or return to – the Church: a slight increase compared to 2016 (5,269).
The number of baptisms and confirmations increased, but there were fewer First Communions and religious weddings, which reveals a decrease in religious practice.
We can reasonably infer from these numbers that there is a movement of continuous secularization in Austrian society, much like other European societies.
Sources: katolisch.at / SIR / FSSPX.News
