Are you in a large parish or a small parish?

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The parish you attend is it large, small, medium, or any form of number of parishioners?
After visiting various parishes Ive enjoyed being in large parishes with many faithful Catholics and also in small close knit Catholic parishes.
 
I guess that depends on the definition of small, medium and large. And do you mean number of people or physical area? 😉

My parish has somewhere around 2,300 registered families or say between 10 and 12 thousand (potential) parishioners. That is from a geographic area that is roughly 50 - 60 square miles with somewhere around 65 to 70 thousand reisdents. Most the parishes in the local deanery are similar since the area used to be fairly rural, but had grown by something like 500% in the past 20 years. Parishes that 20 years ago used to serve towns of 5-7000 now cover populations of 30 - 60,000+.

So my parish might seem large to some, but they might be medium (or small) when compared to large costal city parishes. Its all a matter of perspective. 😃
 
Large parish here in Texas, over 4k families registered. I do miss the small town feel of the military diocese, but I do love my parish.
 
We have 2500 registered parishioners and growing.

We are in the process of building a new church closer to the center of boundaries.

Our church is currently at the exact east end of the boundaries. The western and southern ends used to be cotton and sorghum fields and citrus orchards. Now they are thriving subdivisions. So we are moving closer to where the people are.
 
I live in Sheffield, UK [population over 500,000], my parish is neither small nor particularly large, although our priest does serve another small parish a few miles away as well.
 
Only one Catholic parish in our small town of 7300, we are a small parish with fewer than 450 families/1500 members and one priest. There is an aboriginal Mission 26 miles away (our Pastor ministers to them until they have a missionary appointed) and the next nearest Catholic parish is 350 miles away.

Outnumbered 3:1 by members of other religions, our town also has Pentecostal (largest non-Catholic group), United Church of Canada, Salvation Army, Anglican, Moravian, Jehovah’s Witness, Baptist, non-denominational military parish, Gospel Hall, Menonite Central Committee, & Baha’i

Since I moved here 16 years ago the Apostolic Church and the Church of the Nazarene have closed and their small congregations absorbed by other denominations. In my 16 years here we’ve had one convert, the Anglican wife of a parishioner who was received into full communion about 5 years ago.
 
Where i.go its a big parish. It has a large choir, the Bishop, quite a few priests, a very big organ, soloists & most importantly -.lots of mass times + a very big altar, as well as a separate chapel. Its great cause you can just go & pray & no one expects anything of you or notices you, cause there’s a lot of people. Its boring & doesnt cause distractions. Its just me & Him. But the mass is great & the solo singers have voices straight from God.
 
not sure of the exact size…but we have two priests (generally both are at Sunday Mass, if one is not, we have an Acolyte or Permanent Deacon for the 2nd spot for Communion. We do not use EMHCs for anything other than taking communion to the home bound) and we support a parish grade school and the local Catholic high school. There are usually around 300 or so students in the grade school…not sure how many families that would be…as there are also elderly parishoners and those with teen children or college aged children.
 
Medium ish

950 Registered families, but they are large families, 6 or more kids is pretty common.

So the main Sunday Masses tend to have 3000 or more and we have two Sat eve Masses, and 5 Sunday Masses.

Two assigned priests and two weekend assistant priests ( one ‘retired’ who helps out and one African priest who is studying for an advanced degree. He helps out at our parish as well.)
 
Our parish has about 3600 registered families totaling over 11,000 people. We only have one priest, but five weekend Masses and daily Mass on Tuesday through Friday.
 
I thought it was small. But it sounds like it is more medium.

1000 families plus 2000 students.

We have two priests.
 
Small parish. It stays open partly because of its historical significance, along with the generosity of the parishioners, good economic/business acumen of the pastorand the income made from weddings of couples who aren’t parishioners.
 
Small - probably between 200 to 250 registered individuals/families. One priest. It’s a large city so there are many Catholic churches in the metro area.
 
Large–3200 families, approx. 10,000 parishoners. Two regular priests and one in residence who shares the weekend Mass schedule and helps around the parish along with his job for the Diocese. We have two Deacons also. 7 Masses on the weekends except for the Summer months. We also have a very busy and full school, grades 1-8.

This is a very Catholic area with many ethnic churches, Eastern Catholic Churches, and Eastern Orthodox Churches, plus the city we are a suburb of is the seat of the Diocese.
 
Very small parish. I’d guess probably the smallest parish most people will ever see. We’ve got 18 registered families, but about 12 families are able to regularly attend. Average Sunday attendance is about 60, with nearly half of those being children under 12.
 
adawgj said:
The parish you attend is it large, small, medium, or any form of number of parishioners?
After visiting various parishes Ive enjoyed being in large parishes with many faithful Catholics and also in small close knit Catholic parishes.
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I don’t know how a parish size is defined.
Our parish has 14,000 parishioners. We have an 80% Mass attendance and require 10 Masses every Sunday to accommodate everyone. We have 3 priests.
 
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