In the years since World War II there has been a substantial reduction in the number of priests per capita in the Catholic Church, a phenomenon considered by many to constitute a "shortage" in the number of priests. From 1980 to 2012, the ratio of Catholics per priest increased globally, with the number of Catholics per priest going from 1,895 to 3,126.[1]
In 2014, there were 49,153 parishes in the world that had no resident priest pastor.[2] Between 1970 and 2023, the number of priests declined from 419,728 to 407,872 despite a large increase in the number of Catholics.[3][4][2][5]
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