Priest Cites Drop in Catholic Conversions
“We American Catholics should hang our heads in shame,” says Father Alvin Illig, citing the low rate of conversions to the faith from among those 80 million Americans with no church affiliations.
Illig, director of the Paulist National Catholic Evangelization Assn., referred to the last church statistical summary, showing that a church of 52 million members had only 87,996 conversions in 1986, down 3,754 from the pevious year.
This means “there were only 1.67 converts for every 1,000 Cathoilic parishoners. We should be ashamed of ourselves and ask God’s forgiveness.”
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