USA: Towards the suppression of 100 parishes in Chicago?

According to the Chicago Tribune, the Archdiocese of Chicago intends to launch an audit that could lead to the suppression of about 100 parishes. On February 7, the American daily presented a picture of a situation that would be “untenable” for the third largest diocese of the United States, with over 2,600,000 Catholics.

Holy Name Cathedral of Chicago.

Approximately 10 priests are ordained every year in the archdiocese of Chicago. This number is smaller than the number that retires every year.

American Catholic website Crux recalled, on February 7, that in 2012 the archdiocese ran a deficit of $42 million, recording at the same time a steady drop in baptisms and marriages since 2000. Last January, the diocese also announced the closure of three Catholic schools.

Chicago is not the only American diocese faced with financial problems and a shortage of priests, as, according to Crux, “the nerve centre of Catholicism is shifting from Irish, German and Italian Midwest and Northeastern parishes towards the flourishing Hispanic parishes in the South and the West.” Yet even if the number of faithful has increased, by the same percentage in the south and the west, “it is not certain that the Hispanics can counteract the general decline.”

(Sources: kipa-apic.ch – Crux Now – Chicago Tribune – DICI no. 322, 11/03/16)

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