"The Christianity of history is not Protestantism. If ever there were a safe truth it is this, and Protestantism has ever felt it so; to be deep in history is to cease to be a Protestant." (-John Henry Newman, An Essay on the Development of Christian Doctrine).

"Where the bishop is, there let the people gather; just as where ever Jesus Christ is, there is the Catholic Church". -St. Ignatius of Antioch (ca 110 AD)a martyr later thrown to the lions, wrote to a church in Asia Minor. Antioch was also where the term "Christian" was first used.

“But if I should be delayed, you should know how to behave in the household of God, which is the church of the living God, the pillar and foundation of truth.” 1 Timothy 3:15

"This is the sole Church of Christ, which in the Creed we profess to be one, holy, catholic and apostolic." -CCC 811

Wednesday, May 25, 2016

Catholic Church better at retaining faithful than other churches, study finds

Source: CatholicSay
May 24, 2016


The Church has the highest retention rate of any denomination, but the lowest rate of conversions

English and Welsh Catholicism in 2016 is a religion mainly of cradle Catholics, according to a new study.

The report finds that 3.8m people in England and Wales identify as Catholic, while 6.2m say they were raised Catholic.

This means Catholics have the strongest retention rate of any Christian denomination in England and Wales – 55.8 per cent of cradle Catholics still identify as Catholic. But the Church also has the lowest rate of conversions: only 7.7 per cent.

The figures come in the first report issued by the Catholic Research Forum, a new initiative of the Benedict XVI Centre at St Mary’s University. The forum aims to provide “academically rigorous and pastorally useful" research.

The report, authored by the centre’s director Dr Stephen Bullivant, is based on data from the British Social Attitudes survey (BSA).

Bullivant told the Catholic Herald: “However depressing our retention stats are, they’re actually the strongest of the main denominations. To put it a bit crudely, it’s a “losing game" for everyone, but we’re doing something less catastrophic than others."

It offers a statistical picture of Catholicism broken down by region, age, ethnicity, frequency of Mass attendance and several other categories. It also provides a broader account of religion in England and Wales, showing that the fastest-growing churches are those outside the Anglican Communion or the Catholic Church, and that nearly half the population (48.5 per cent) say they have “no religion".

According to the report, the Catholic population has remained steady over the last 30 years, and is now 8.3 per cent. By contrast, the proportion of the population identifying as Anglican has slipped from 44.5 per cent in 1983 to 19 per cent in 2014.

A common theory is that this is down to immigration. The report finds that, according to the BSA’s categories, there are more people of “Black (African origin)" among the Catholic population than among the general population. The same goes for “Asian (other)", a category which includes Filipinos and Vietnamese.

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