Global Catholic population continues to grow

(February 21, 2011) The number of baptized Catholics on the planet continues to grow with nearly half of them in the Americas. The number of priests and seminarians is also on the rise. These are some of the data from the 2011 ‘Annuario Pontificio’ or papal yearbook, presented to Benedict XVI on Saturday. The Church statistics with updates till the year 2009 furnish a summary view of the principal dynamics of the Catholic Church in her 2,956 ecclesiastical territories across the globe. The number of baptized Catholics has increased from nearly 1.16 billion in 2008 to 1.18 billion in 2009, with an absolute increase of 15 million faithful. The Americas are home to 49.4% of the world’s Catholics. In Asia the Catholic population grew from 10.6% to 10.7% while the total population of Asia is 60.7% of the world’s population. The total population of Europe, with respect to the total population of the globe, was three points below that of the Americas and represented 24% of the world’s Catholic population. The countries of Africa and Oceania were both reported to be 15.2% of the world’s population and 0.8% of the total Catholic population of the planet. The number of priests continues the trend of moderate increase that began in 2000. The number of diocesan and religious priests grew in the last decade from 405,178 in 2000 to 410,593 in 2009. In 2009 the number of priests increased by 0.34% over 2008, with a surge in diocesan priests. There was a decrease in religious priests on every continent except for Asia and Africa. The number of candidates for the priesthood has climbed 0.82%, increasing from 117,024 in 2008 to 117,978 in 2009. A large part of the growth is attributable to Asia and Africa, with 2.39% and 2.2% growth respectively.