Why has Mass attendance for Catholics been declining for many years?

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Hi everybody,

What reasons or combination of reasons do you think best explains why Mass attendance has been declining over the years? And what do you think can stem the decline and turn it around where we have catholics once again attending mass regularly? Do you think it’s the way the liturgy is done in some churches? The way some churches have been renovated? Some way out there things being done in the “spirit of Vatican II”? The culture of our present day? Or a combination of different reasons?

I ask because our pastor made note of declining mass attendance and said there was probably several reasons why but didn’t mention any in particular. He just said that we need to take a harder look at our faith. I wonder, is it the faith that needs a harder look or the way our faith has been presented, taught, and safeguarded that needs a harder look?

In Christ,
Scarlet
 
I think it had a lot to do with the “sexual revolution” and the overall on demand consumerism and materialism in this country as well as the brand of “social justice” that is popular today. The Church goes against these “virtues” of our society.
 
I believe that Mass attendence has declined because the world has become to enticing to many whose faith was never a great deal of importance in the first place. We live in a time that is becoming more & more Godless & much more centered on the self, which is the greatest form of satanistic expression,“do as thou wilt”.

Ignorance, weakness & indiference, these are the reasons people turn from God & inherit damnation.

I see the decline in Mass attendence as both negative & positive. Negative because people have turned from the Truth, but positive in knowing that many that do remain strong in their faith have been given that special grace by The Lord.

WE MUST KEEP RUNNING THE RACE.
 
I wonder if that is true? Does anyone know of any web sites that cite statistics? That would be an interesting read…
 
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Scarlet:
Hi everybody,

What reasons or combination of reasons do you think best explains why Mass attendance has been declining over the years? And what do you think can stem the decline and turn it around where we have catholics once again attending mass regularly? Do you think it’s the way the liturgy is done in some churches? The way some churches have been renovated? Some way out there things being done in the “spirit of Vatican II”? The culture of our present day? Or a combination of different reasons?

I ask because our pastor made note of declining mass attendance and said there was probably several reasons why but didn’t mention any in particular. He just said that we need to take a harder look at our faith. I wonder, is it the faith that needs a harder look or the way our faith has been presented, taught, and safeguarded that needs a harder look?
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I believe that the primary reason is immorality. From there one could list thousands of reasons why attendance at mass is not proportional to population growth. 500 to 700 years ago, there was the Catholic Church. There were generally no other Christian religions and if you were Christian you went to Mass. In that brief span of history, there grew some 33,000+ different Christian denominations. Why is that? I believe that it started with people not liking something(s) in particular about the Catholic Church so they broke away and started another Church which held to many of the Catholic beliefs but left out the thing(s) that they didn’t like. Then, some in the new Church said, "We don’t like ________. Therefore, they in turn broke off from that particular church, keeping most of the beliefs but eliminating the dogma that they did not like. This continued to happen and each time there was a break, people rethought their beliefs and a few would leave their family’s Church and join a new one. Now, we have 33,000+ denominations and Christianity has been watered down to the point that society views all Churches as equal. It is like going to a restaurant and being presented with a menu. The roast beef dinner comes with mashed potatoes and carrots; the hamburger comes with fries; the spaghetti comes with a salad and garlic bread. People choose what they like and do not like (which items THEY want) as opposed to what GOD wants, because it feels (tastes) good to THEM. Today’s Pentecostals and Evangelical denominations are keeping up with and in some areas surpassing population growth while the Catholic Church (though growing) is falling behind with the overall growth in population. (See religioustolerance.org/worldrel.htm). According to the report, Catholic population growth is at 1.3% per year while the overall population growth is at 1.4% per year, indicating that we are not keeping up with world population. On the other hand, the Pentecostal denominations realize an 8.1% increase per year and the Evangelicals gain a 5.4% increase annually, well above the world population growth. Now here is a scary number… The population of Islam is growing at a rate of 20% per year! The report suggests that by 2025 30% of the world’s population will be Muslim (3 out of 10 people you meet in the world).
Therefore, to sum everything up, the Catholic Church is actually gaining members every year BUT that gain is not equal to the growth of population and is certainly not equal to Protestant or Muslim growth. Sorry, about the long reply.😦
God bless.
 
No one ever mentions that in areas where population is growing, churches are packed. And new parishes cannot be built due to lack of priests.

Meanwhile in areas where population is declining, and parishes really ought to be closed, the appearance is that attendance is declining.

Maybe it’s nothing more than that.
 
Liberalism - Liberalism is a Sin

Liberalism is the root of heresy, the tree of evil in whose branches all the harpies of infidelity find ample shelter; it is today the evil of all evils. (Ch. 4). “The theater, literature, public and private morals are all saturated with obscenity and impurity. The result is inevitable; a corrupt generation necessarily begets a revolutionary generation. Liberalism is the program of naturalism. Free-thought begets free morals, or immorality. Restraint is thrown off and a free rein given to the passions. Whoever thinks what he pleases will do what he pleases. Liberalism in the intellectual order is license in the moral order. Disorder in the intellect begets disorder in the heart, and vice-versa. Thus does Liberalism propagate immorality, and immorality Liberalism.” (Ch. 26).

Liberalism “is, therefore, the radical and universal denial of all divine truth and Christian dogma, the primal type of all heresy, and the supreme rebellion against the authority of God and His Church. As with Lucifer, its maxim is, ‘I will not serve.’” (Ch. 3).

“Liberalism, whether in the doctrinal or practical order, is a sin. In the doctrinal order, it is heresy, and consequently a mortal sin against faith. In the practical order, it is a sin against the commandments of God and of the Church, for it virtually transgresses all commandments. To be more precise: in the doctrinal order, Liberalism strikes at the very foundations of faith; it is heresy radical and universal, because within it are comprehended all heresies. In the practical order it is a radical and universal infraction of the divine law, since it sanctions and authorizes all infractions of that law.”

The Liberal Catholic calls himself a Catholic because he firmly believes Catholicity to be the veritable revelation of the Son of God; he calls himself a Liberal Catholic because he believes that no one can impose upon him any belief which his individual judgment does not measure as perfectly rational. What is not rational he rejects; he is intellectually free to accept or reject. What appears good he assents to, but he is intellectually bound to no one. Thus, unwittingly, he falls an easy victim to the snare set by the devil for the intellectually proud. He has substituted the naturalistic principle of free examination for the supernatural principle of faith. As a consequence, he is really not Christian, but pagan
 
Vatican II and all of the changes that it brought has wreaked havoc on the church and all within it. It gets tiring hearing people say , Oh, you have to live with it, and “the holy spirit will make things better”. Well I for one say where was the holy spirit when the council was called and why did the holy spirit allow for these bad results to take place?

That is easy-the holy spirit was never invoked, it was a Pastoral council not docrinal. And I have to think that the subject matter of the council, religious freedom , Ecumenism , the Novus Ordo Mass, and Modernism-all putting MAN above GOD were the reasons why the Holy Spirit was not invoked. Who needs God?> We are man -Modern Man at that and WE know better!

Take the church back from those who dont even have the guts to stand up for a woman who has just died after 14 days of being starved. I give the Protestants and even Joe Lieberman credit as they actually had the guts to stand up and speak out. But the church? One or two Priests maybe. The Bishop of Florida? Where was he? This is due to Vatican II-as priest after priest said “the reason why there are so few church Bishops speaking out to protect Terri Schiavo is because after Vatican II , the church will not impose its beliefs on anyone, and we are a different church than the one 2000 years ago”. This was on Meet the Press-I thought Tim Russert and the rest of the panel, who were Moslems , Protestants, and Jews were going to fall out of their chair. When Tim Russert Pressed this high ranking Priest some more-again he invoked Vatican II.
 
This is terrible and true in many of the parishes around my diocese. Attendance actually appears to be greater in some more affluent areas but declining in poorer parishes.
What strikes me most is the huge decline in numbers at for Holy Days of Obligation other than Easter and Christmas.
Why? There are many various reasons.
  • disgust and disallusionment because of the recent bishop/priest sex scandals (important to put bishop/priest together)
  • the ever increasing materialistic/competitive world allures people away
  • the ever increasing gap between wealthy and poor is causing a rift in the USA Church causing both wealthy and poor to fall away
  • lack of priests and religious
  • parishes being run like business rather than places of prayer and worship
  • dumming down of religious education - not keeping up with the times we live in - people have access to much more knowledge and the shepherds should be regularly spoon feeding people more because the flock is hungry
  • too many paid employees who depend on income are running parishes (Jesus is clear about how wrong this is)
  • lack of simple obedience from the faithful (Simple Obedience is the HUGEst problem)
These are just a few of the more obvious reasons.
 
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Scarlet:
Hi everybody,

What reasons or combination of reasons do you think best explains why Mass attendance has been declining over the years?
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I think your information must be inaccurate or selective to a particular geographical district. Where I live, our church has allways been full and we have had to constantly expand the church to accomodate the ever increasing community. In fact, we almost doubled the size of the church two years ago, now it is overflowing and they have to stand.

Can you please give the figures on which you base your contention?
Where can we get the official count of the number of Catholics in the world and U.S.?
 
The Church has lost its heritage brought on by the Modernist’s interpretation of V2.
 
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Ignatius:
I think your information must be inaccurate or selective to a particular geographical district. Where I live, our church has allways been full and we have had to constantly expand the church to accomodate the ever increasing community. In fact, we almost doubled the size of the church two years ago, now it is overflowing and they have to stand.

Can you please give the figures on which you base your contention?
Where can we get the official count of the number of Catholics in the world and U.S.?
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Father didn’t give any figures to base his contention of declining mass attendance. But I do remember very clearly reading a few years ago in the diocese newspapers statistics bearing out that mass attendance is in decline in the United States. Not only that, but when I was serving on our RCIA team, it was reported by our director to the candidates that statistically, after people become catholic at the vigil, their participation in mass attendance declines dramatically. BTW, did you see Romano’s post and link above?

Scarlet
 
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Scarlet:
I did a little searching on google and found this site:

cara.georgetown.edu/bulletin/index.htm

I think it has some interesting statistics that help bear out father’s contention of declining mass attendance.

Scarlet
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I can’t find the website right now, but the increase in the number of Catholics can be mostly attributed to immigration. The number of infant baptisms and first communions have been falling since 1965. Additionally, I have read that native born U.S. Catholics have a birthrate below the replacement rate.
 
The real reason that mass attendence has been declining is because after Vatican II dissendents misled the bishops into believing that the homily was no longer the time to teach the faith. The bishops and those who teach homiletics at the seminaries now think the homily is ONLY to be a commentary on scripture.

Thus, Catholics no longer hear the whole Gospel. They are no longer taught the moral law, centered on the ten commandments, as the Church has done for 2000 years. They no longer hear any teachings on sexual morality, on the seriousness of sin, especially mortal sin, they no longer understand the importance of the sacraments, and especially of the Eucharist. The no longer understand the necessity of God’s grace to overcome sin.
Why do you think everyone goes to communion, even those in mortal sin? Because they are not being taught all of God’s word.

This is NOT because of bad priests. It is because a total lack of understanding of the content of the homily by all bishops and most priests. They all believe the homily is primarily to explain the readings, the scriptures read that day at mass.

If you don’t believe me, then ask any priest what the homily is supposed to be about. 95% will say the homily is primarily supposed to explain the scriptures. This is what they were falsely taught in the seminaries, and the bishops have done nothing to correct this error.
Code: 
 This is false.  The Church has always taught that the homily is the primary place to teach the faith, not to explain the scriptures.
The faith consists in God’s word handed down in scripture and tradition which is taught by the Church which we believe.
This faith can ONLY be taught by explaining and teaching the elements of the creed, sacraments, commandments and prayer.

The apostles did not spread the faith by reading scriptures to the pagans. They did not read the gospels, starting with the geneologies and convert pagans by reading these Gospels and by explaining them.

The converted those pagans who were interested in Christianity by evangelizing and TEACHING the faith. And the ONLY way they taught the faith was by explaining and teaching the elements of the creed, sacraments, commandments and prayer, then using scripture to illuminate the teachings, nourish the teachings, and as a witness to the teachings. There is no other way to spread the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Notice the priority. Teachings, then scripture to nourish the teachings. The homilies today are the opposite. Scripture is used as the norm, and teachings are fit in haphazardly in explaining the scriptures.

This is absolutely wrong. The Church teaches that the Catechism is the sure norm for teaching the faith. Scripture is NOT the sure norm for teaching the faith.

Since the correct method is no longer done at mass, Catholics are forgetting the little they learned and thus leaving the Church.

Some Catholics who have an ability to learn by reading and who have the desire can learn some on their own. But this is not the primary way we are supposed to learn the faith. We are supposed to be taught by the priests at mass. The priests don’t know this because they have been misled by their teachers at the seminaries and by the bishops who are silent on all this.
 
Ignatius writes:
I think your information must be inaccurate or selective to a particular geographical district. Where I live, our church has allways been full and we have had to constantly expand the church to accomodate the ever increasing community. In fact, we almost doubled the size of the church two years ago, now it is overflowing and they have to stand.
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I bet you’re from the South. Overall, Catholic attendance at mass has been decreasing, but in much of the south, it would appear otherwise.

The South traditionally had a very low percentage of Catholics, but over the past 20 years, immigration from the highly Catholic rust belt after the closure of industry as well as from Latin America, has expanded the Catholic churches in many areas of the south.

It gives the impression that the church is expanding from your narrow view, just as in the north we are having a lot of church closures but it just makes it seem worse than it actually is, as much of it is due to a population which many are dying or leaving the cities .
 
Why is attendance declining?

Because we here in the West (that’s Western Civilization) are media saturated drones, as a general rule, and the media is telling us that religion is a waste of time.

Solution #1: Kill your television.

#2: Return to the sacraments
 
The main reason of the decline is simply that few today understand what the Mass really is.

This is turn is because of poor catechesis, poor Liturgy, poor church design. In addition I see the parish makeup in many places as being a blending of Catholic and Protestant. Keeping this in mind since I am involved in RCIA I have seen many protestants who entered the Catholic Church through RCIA become more Catholic than most cradle Catholics.

However the opposite is true in many places where the RCIA process is very poor. There seems to be a mixing of Catholic and Protestant ideas and understandings especially about the Mass. Sometimes it is difficult for people to understand that the Mass is not just another “Sunday Service” or “Prayer Meeting” or “Community Celebration” equal to any other Sunday Protestant service.
 
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