Number of seminarians, weddings, infant baptisms per Catholic place them in nation’s top 10
By Deacon Bob Hunt
An article published last month by The Catholic World Report purports to rank the Catholic dioceses in the United States by how fruitful each diocese is in terms of seminarians, weddings, infant baptisms, and adult receptions into the Church. Those dioceses with higher rates of those four categories as measured against the number of Catholics in that diocese were judged to be more fruitful than dioceses with lower rates.
So, for instance, my old stomping ground as a young man was the Diocese of Arlington in northern Virginia. According to the stats reported in the CWR article, Arlington had one seminarian for every 10,827 Catholics, one Catholic wedding for every 327 Catholics, one infant baptism for every 90 Catholics, and one adult reception into the Church for every 227 Catholics. That means Arlington ranks 43rd among U.S. dioceses in fruitfulness. The CWR article doesn’t include this information, but there are just over 432,000 registered Catholics in the Diocese of Arlington. So, not too shabby for my old home diocese.
But Arlington doesn’t compare with what is going on in Tennessee. Of the 178 Latin-rite dioceses in the United States, the Diocese of Nashville ranks first in fruitfulness (tied with Tulsa, Okla.), the Diocese of Knoxville ranks fifth in fruitfulness, and the Diocese of Memphis ranks 10th in fruitfulness. So, all three of the dioceses within the state of Tennessee rank in the top 10 for fruitfulness. I think that’s pretty amazing! I doubt that any other state even comes close to matching Tennessee in fruitfulness of Catholic dioceses.
For the record, here are the stats for each Tennessee diocese in the four categories used to measure fruitfulness:
- Nashville: seminarians = 1/3,944 Catholics; weddings = 1/239 Catholics; infant baptisms = 1/47 Catholics; adult receptions = 1/137 Catholics
- Knoxville: seminarians = 1/6,836; weddings = 1/270; infant baptisms = 1/64; adult receptions = 1/108
- Memphis: seminarians = 1/5,558; weddings = 1/324; infant baptisms = 1/60; adult receptions = 1/187
What explains this? Why are the three dioceses in Tennessee so fruitful according to the categories CWR uses to measure fruitfulness?
The CWR article suggests that Tennessee’s dioceses are thriving because they are very small, some of the smallest in the nation. Memphis Catholics represent only 4.5 percent of the population of West Tennessee. Nashville Catholics make up only 3.1 percent of the population of Middle Tennessee. Knoxville Catholics are even more rare, making up only 2.8 percent of the population of East Tennessee. Indeed, according to the most recent statistics from Catholic-Hierarchy.org from 1995-2005, the Diocese of Knoxville represented the smallest diocese in the United States when it came to Catholics as a percentage of the population.
Larger dioceses tend not to do so well in rates of fruitfulness. The CWR article makes this surprising observation: “Correlation is not causation, but there does seem to be a terrible cost to souls once an American diocese grows over 700,000 Catholics: the combination of baptism, conversion, seminarian, and wedding rates inevitably falls below average.” What is the average for dioceses across the United States? It is 1 seminarian/14,473 Catholics; weddings = 1/453; infant baptisms = 1/113; and adult receptions = 1/413.
Advantages to a small diocese, both in the numbers of Catholics and in territory, are that the people get to know their priests and their bishop fairly well. In fact, it’s almost like living in a small town, where everybody knows everybody. I know it’s true in Knoxville that, whenever there’s a big diocesan event, it’s like a family reunion. You get to see people you haven’t seen in a while and the opportunity to catch up.
A smaller diocese generally means smaller parishes, at least outside the larger cities. This means that each parish is more akin to a family than an organization.
I recently visited Mountain City in Tennessee to give an Advent retreat at the parish up there, St. Anthony of Padua. The deacon of the parish, Joe Herman, is a classmate of mine in deacon formation, and we were ordained together. He treated me to dinner Friday night and breakfast the next morning, and we ran a couple of errands before the retreat. It seemed everywhere we went, we bumped into someone Joe knew. Also, in a diocese where the parishes are smaller, the people tend to take more ownership of their parish and responsibility for its ministries, not leaving everything to the priests, deacons, or staff (if they have staff!).
But it’s not just the small size of the Tennessee dioceses that contributes to effective fruitfulness. I think, too, there is a welcoming spirit in Tennessee that some of our northern confreres may lack.
It’s not unusual for people in Tennessee to ask others about where they go to church, how they like their pastor, and what ministries they’re involved in. I suspect such questions would be considered rude in other parts of the country, but not here in the South. People genuinely want to get to know each other, and church remains a common denominator for most Southerners.
We are also experiencing growth among young people that the entire Church seems to share. In the OCIA program at Holy Ghost Church, where I am the director, we have 30 in our class this year. The average age of our catechumens is 23 years old. The average age of our candidates is 29. And we have four confirmandi, all of whom are under the age of 30. That’s amazing! I’ve never experienced that in RCIA, and I’ve been involved in a lot of different programs in different parishes.
All in all, it seems obvious that the Church in Tennessee is alive and well. I pray it stays so. Being smaller is nice, and it has its advantages. But, of course, the mission of the Church is to preach the Gospel to all in hopes that all to whom the Gospel is preached embrace it. So, here’s a prayer that the Church in Tennessee doesn’t stay so small for long!
Be Christ for all. Bring Christ to all. See Christ in all.
Deacon Bob Hunt is a husband, father, grandfather, and parishioner at All Saints Church in Knoxville.