The Bergoglian Age in numbers: in ancient Christian countries, but not only, the number of Catholics is declining. Of course, there are many reasons for this, such as secularization, urbanization, competition from competing ideologies and religions, and the unravelling of family units and traditional values in many places. But the statistics point to a worrying acceleration since the start of Pope Francis’ pontificate, particularly in places where bishops and indeed the Church as a whole pride themselves on their progressivism and their entry into the marvellous synodality.
Germany, spearhead of Catholic progressivism, loses 500,000 Catholics a year
A prime example is Germany, spearhead of progressivism in the Church, whose dioceses are, along with the United States, the Vatican’s main source of money. In August 2024, Riposte Catholique published statistics on “church exits” in Germany, showing that while their bishops are fleeing ahead in a less and less Catholic “synodal path,” German Catholics are losing interest in their religion:
“Church departures declined compared to last year: 402,694, to be compared with the 2022 figure of 522,821 departures, but the statistical office notes that this is nevertheless the second-highest figure in the history of church departure statistics. If one adds ‘deaths, entries and moves,’ the number of Church members in Germany has fallen by 591,718. At national level, the statistics still count around 20.3 million Catholics at the reference date of December 31, 2023. A year earlier, the figure was still 20.94 million.
As there are also 18.56 million Protestants in Germany, the majority of Germans are no longer Christian – or rather, no longer officially attached to one of the country’s main Christian churches. As a reminder, in 2020 Germany still had 22 million Catholics and 20 million Protestants for a population of 83 million. The decline of the Catholic population can also be seen in another statistic, shared by Katolisch.de on July 9: “In 2011, there were still 23 cities with a Catholic majority in Germany. Now only Münster, Paderborn, Bottrop and Trier remain. In Regensburg and Ingolstadt, for example, the proportion of Catholics has fallen by almost a quarter”
Above all, church departures are accelerating, in line with the dynamics of the “German Synodal Way” and thus with the line of thought promoted by Pope Francis: “if in 2010 181,000 Catholics and 141,000 Protestants had left their churches, in 2020 they were 221,000 and 220,000 respectively.
In 2011, there were 24.07 million Catholics and 23.37 million Protestants – the two religions then accounted for 60% of Germans”.
And of course, fewer Catholics means less tax redistributed to the Church and therefore to the dioceses, and consequently to the Vatican – we’ll come back to this: “in 2023, the revenues of the 27 German dioceses will amount to 6.51 billion euros. This represents 330 million euros, or 5% less than in 2022. When inflation is taken into account, the decline is even more marked.”
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