Counting the flock is educated guesswork

When Archbishop Anthony J. Bevilacqua arrived here in 1988 to head the Philadelphia Archdiocese, it appeared that he brought with him more than 130,000 Catholics.

In his first year, the official tally of church members leaped from 1.27 million to 1.40 million. It kept climbing during the next three years, as 54,000 more were added to the ranks.

Between 1992 and 1996 the trend reversed, and 52,000 Catholics apparently disappeared.

But by 2000, nearly 84,000 had reappeared: The archdiocese reported a "total population figure" of nearly 1.50 million for the Vatican's yearbook, Annuarium Statisticum Ecclesiae.

Have Catholics in the Philadelphia area been multiplying miraculously, like the loaves and fishes?

Only on paper.

Behind the numerical swings are the murky methods of religious nose-counting.

It is "at best an inexact science," said Mary Gautier, a nationally prominent Catholic researcher at Georgetown University in Washington. Statisticians, herself included, aren't always sure what to make of the numbers presented by bishops, for whom a big, robust diocese can carry what she called "bragging rights."

The Vatican claims a global flock of 1.1 billion, making Roman Catholicism the largest Christian church.

No one knows how many are devout believers warming a pew on Sundays. For accounting purposes, however, it doesn't matter. Baptism in the faith is the only requirement for inclusion on the rolls.

The church's world total is fed by many sources, from government censuses to parish registries. But also added in are sincere estimates, guesses and outright exaggerations, depending on the country, the diocese, and even the pastor doing the reporting.

For instance, in Africa - the only continent where Catholicism is said to be making dramatic gains - some dioceses are so poor, unstructured and understaffed that they can merely approximate memberships. Consider the Archdiocese of Dar es Salaam in Tanzania, which reports a Catholic membership that is exactly 30 percent of the city's population.

In Europe and Latin America, many national censuses ask households about religious affiliation, although not whether they practice that faith. Consequently, the numbers do not begin to reflect the serious ground the church has been losing among worshippers.

In the United States, the Census Bureau last asked about religion in 1930. So the job of counting Catholics falls to the 193 dioceses (including 15 Eastern Rite eparchies). Each year pastors provide the diocese with tallies of Catholics in their parishes. The figure usually is based on parish registration, sacramental records, and average Mass attendance every October.

However, many are asked to go a step further and take a stab at estimating the number of Catholics in their bailiwicks who are not registered.

That can be legitimate methodology, Gautier said, particularly where immigrants are a significant presence. Many newly arrived Latino and Asian Catholics do not sign up with a parish, either because it is not customary in their homelands, or because they are seasonal or illegal residents.

Occasionally, the guesswork produces "something gigantic," she said. "I have a problem with that."

The Philadelphia Archdiocese approximates its unregistered Catholics at 234,415 - about 16 percent of its total count.

Although Robert J. Miller, director of the archdiocesan Office for Research and Planning, called the estimates "pretty conservative," they have softened, if not masked, a 7 percent decline in registered members during the last three decades.

The sudden, substantial jump in membership during the late 1980s was largely an estimate of unregistered Latinos, according to Miller.

Cardinal John Krol had overlooked that population in the annual tallies. His successor, Bevilacqua, went to the other extreme and assumed that virtually all Latinos were Catholic. In fact, about one-quarter are Protestant.

In the 1990s, the archdiocese tried more realistic formulas, finally deciding in 2002 to claim 72.6 percent of all Latino residents as Catholics. That would place the present number around 150,000, Miller said.

The estimating does not end with them, however. It also sweeps much of the local college population onto the church rolls.

For instance, all 39,945 undergraduate and graduate students at the 11 Catholic colleges and universities in the archdiocese are included. So are 32 percent of students at the non-Catholic institutions, for an additional 50,000, and 25,503 more who visit those campuses' church-sponsored Newman Centers.

In the estimates, there is "probably some double-counting," said Miller, whose office is separate from the archdiocesan chancery where the figures are compiled. Young people, he said, are not usually removed from their home parish rolls when they leave for college.

Still, Miller said, he is confident that the numbers give a "fair picture" of the size of the Philadelphia Archdiocese. The latest official count - including estimates - is 1,462,388.