Newspaper Page Text
PAGE 12—The Georgia Bulletin, May 30, 1985
Actual Figures Of Catholic Population Available
BY JERRY FILTEAU
NC News Service
Where did all the Catholics go? It appears they were lost
in a puff of paper smoke but not in reality.
When the 1985 Official Catholic Directory figures were
released May 22, they showed a net decline of nearly 107,000
in the total number of U.S. Catholics.
But the Boston Archdiocese alone lost 172,000 and said
virtually all of it was due to “more precise information
gathering and reporting.”
The state of Florida, despite a general population growth
of about 250,000 and the creation of two new dioceses, show
ed a net loss of 277,000 Catholics. Virtually the whole loss
was due to the decision of the Miami Archdiocese to shift
from estimates to parish registration figures for its method
of reporting.
The New York Archdiocese showed a net loss of 76,000
Catholics between its 1984 and 1985 figures, but sociologist
Father Philip Murnion said he had told the archdiocese
several years ago that its published figures were about
160,000 too high.
“These (Catholic population estimates) should be done in
color rather than numbers — they’re artistic creations,”
said the priest, who heads the New York archdiocesan
Pastoral Life Conference.
Across the nation, a large number of dioceses reported
exactly the same figures in 1985 as they had in 1984 for
general population or Catholic population or both.
Of those that reported changes in Catholic population,
most reported an increase. For example, increases were
reported in Los Angeles, 187,581; San Antonio, 65,687;
Denver, 62,637; and San Diego, 44,782. Only a few reported
declines.
But the declines reported in Florida, Boston and New
York show how drastically national figures can be skewed
in any given year by accounting changes in a few places.
In Boston, from 1979 to 1984, the reported total population
of the archdiocese — Catholics and non-Catholics — had
dropped more than a third, from nearly 5.8 million to less
than 3.7 million. But in the same period, the reported
Catholic population had gone down only 80,000, or 4 percent
- from about 2,016,000 to 1,936,000.
Thus Boston’s 1984-85 loss of 172,000, while the general
population had dropped only another 20,000 during the year,
represented a paper catch-up on the declines of several
years.
“The decline has been much more gradual, but the old
system was not picking it up,” the archdiocese said in a
prepared statement explaining the new figures.
In Florida, the sudden shift in figures was partly hidden
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by the fact that two new dioceses, split from parts of three
existing ones, were created during 1984.
In 1985 the new Diocese of Palm Beach, Fla., reported
103,000 Catholics. The new Diocese of Venice reported near
ly 117,000 Catholics. But their combined gain of almost
220,000 did not match the combined losses of nearly 500,000
by Orlando (20,000 down), St. Petersburg (78,000 down) and
Miami (398,000 down).
Father Gerard LaCerra, Miami archdiocesan chancellor,
said the archdiocese estimated that it lost “21 percent of
our Catholic population” when parts of the territory were
split off to help form the new dioceses.
But Miami took the split as an opportunity for “bringing
ourselves into accord with the practice of the other Florida
dioceses,” he said.
Until then, he said, the archdiocese had used general
population figures and techniques of projection to estimate
its actual number of Catholics. Starting with the new set of
statistics, he said, Miami is using for its official Catholic
count only those actually registered in the parishes of the
archdiocese.
Priest's Wife
It's A New Role
BY JOYCE REYNOLDS
SOUTH KINGSTOWN, R.I. (NC) - Mildred Thom
son’s husband no longer kneels beside her each day at
Mass. That’s just one of the little changes in her life
since he became a Catholic priest.
Both their lives have been drastically altered since
August 1983 when Paul Van K. Thomson of South
Kingstown was ordained under special guidelines
established by the Vatican.
The program allows U.S. Episcopal priests who
convert to Catholicism to be ordained in the Catholic
Church even if they are married.
When Father Thomson celebrates Mass each morn
ing for the sisters at Mount St. Joseph, Mrs. Thomson
accompanies him. “We used to go to daily Mass
together. Well, we go to Mass together,” she paused a
moment, then laughed, “but it’s different, you see.”
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