Recently, a study was released by the Pew Research Center that made a great deal of news. It examined the changes in the numbers of individuals who identified themselves as Christians of various denominations, including Catholic.

The results were sobering. They concluded that between 2007 and 2014, the number of those who professed to be Christians in the United States declined by nearly 8 percent. Over that same period, the number of professed Catholics in this country dropped by approximately 3 percent.

Of course, such a change is not a “zero sum game.” The logical question that has to be asked is, where did those former believers go? And for us as Catholics, where did those who have left the Church end up?

The study shows that the number of those describing themselves as “unaffiliated” grew by approximately 6 percent during that same period. According to the Pew Research Center, the unaffiliated typically describe themselves as being atheistic (believing there is no God), agnostic (believe if there is a God we cannot know anything about Him) or have beliefs of “nothing in particular.”

For us as Catholics, another statistic of concern was that about 40 percent of adults who claim to have been raised as Catholics no longer identify with the faith. As a result, the Pew Research Center concludes that nearly 13 percent of all adults in the United States are former Catholics.

What are we to make of these statistics? What do they tell us about the spiritual moment that we live in and the state of our Catholic faith?

Sadly, the numbers really don’t tell us anything that we didn’t already know, at least in general terms. We need only look around at Mass on Sunday to recognize that the numbers of people attending Mass are not what they should be.

Many of us remember fuller churches and many more young people at Mass just 20 or 30 years ago.

The numbers of Catholic babies, and baptisms and marriages have also declined drastically in recent decades. All of these are a sign, and a consequence, of the lessening of living a life guided by Catholic faith.

We are also living in a society that, enticed by materialism and the sexual revolution, increasingly seeks to eliminate God from thought, discourse and the public square.

People of faith are increasingly mocked or pressured to compromise their faith. That is frequently the case for us as Catholics seeking to be faithful to the moral teaching given to us by Christ.

The situation outlined in the Pew study is a great concern for the Church, of course. Over the last several decades, Pope St. John Paul II, Pope Benedict and Pope Francis have all lamented the loss of faith in the industrialized western world. They have called for a new evangelization, reaching out to those who have lost the faith in the midst of our modern world, as well as to those who have never even known Jesus Christ.

Much of that new evangelization has to be directed “in house.” As Catholics, our witness to Christ has often not been adequate.

In a particular way, our young people are experiencing tremendous challenges to the faith. They need the encouragement, the religious example, and even the correction from adults of faith. But are we giving that example to them?

The loss of faith is also a challenge to society and to the wider world. The fact is that the human race and every man and woman has been created by God to be with Him.

The more God is left out of the life of any person or society, the more that person or society is incomplete and unfulfilled.

Time and again human projects undertaken without God have brought sorrow and destruction to the world. And behind that is the loss of souls who have chosen against God. In short, without God the world is at odds with its inherent purpose.

Of course none of these challenges cause us to lose our hope. Jesus promised that He would be with us until the end of the ages. He told us that He would not leave us orphans to fight these evils on our own.
We know that the Church in her history has seen good times and bad, moments of faith and moments of weakness.

Christ continues to guide and protect us. Our task is to be faithful. We are to witness to others to the strength and grace that we receive from our Catholic faith.

As we look around, we can see a world that is crying out for Jesus Christ. It is a world in need of our faithful, joyful witness, even if in many ways, it does not even know it.