Polish statistician downplays study showing decline in Mass turnout

Published: 2006-02-27

WARSAW, Poland (CNS) -- A church statistician downplayed a recent study showing a continued decline in Mass attendance in Poland. "Mass attendance is only one way of measuring a society's religiousness," said Pallotine Father Witold Zdaniewicz, professor and director of the Warsaw-based Catholic Church Statistics Institute. "The data clearly show a persistent drop in numbers going to church, but the causes and explanations vary considerably." Father Zdaniewicz told Catholic News Service that results of a Sunday Mass head count taken in November would be announced before Pope Benedict XVI's May 25-28 visit. In mid-February, the Polish Press Agency reported that Catholic Church Statistics Institute figures showed 43 percent of Catholics attended Sunday Mass regularly in 2004, compared to 47.5 percent in 2000. Under communist rule in the 1980s, church attendance was 60 percent; in 1991 it was 50 percent. Father Zdaniewicz said the data had to be looked at "holistically -- we can't just consider bare numbers and percentages."

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