Young Catholics in the UK are increasingly taking up distinctive practices and gravitating to parishes that cater to these conservative youth subcultures, according to the study After Secularization. The study, published by the Catholic Truth Society and conducted by Stephen Bullivant, Hannah Vaughan-Spruce, and Bernadette Durcan, is based on a 2019 survey of British Roman Catholics that compared generations in the church. As reported in Church Times (December 2), the study finds a “growing trend of people choosing which parish to attend based on reasons other than pure geography.” Parishes showing growth have accepted these changes, moving from operating as a generalist organization that serves a heterogeneous market to a specialist mode that caters to newcomers who want a more traditional expression of the faith, from observing the Latin Mass to saying the rosary, devotion to the saints, and claims of supernatural experiences.
The young Catholics’ differences from older generations are borne out in the survey results, which show that 41 percent of 18-to-24-year-olds reported attending Mass weekly, compared to only 17 percent of 55-to-64-year-olds. About two-thirds of this youngest cohort said they “definitely” or “probably” believed in the real presence of Christ in the Eucharist, compared with 41 percent of the older age group. Bullivant says that liberal-conservative differences also exist between younger and older priests. The study emphasizes that Catholic decline continues, with Mass attendance falling from almost 2 million in 1980 to 592,000 in 2022. But it predicts that the decline will “bottom out” and, to a degree, reverse, although such a revival will result from drawing on these conservative sources rather than appealing to the shrinking “middle of a middle that is becoming less and less Christian…”
