Salvage of members: Churches lose more than a million members

The two large Christian churches lost more than a million members last year due to withdrawals and deaths. As good news, church representatives interpreted that the number of withdrawals is no longer as high as in previous years. The number of Catholics fell under the 20 million mark for the first time last year, which of the Protestants among the 18 million mark.

As the Evangelical Church in Germany (EKD) announced in Hanover, 17,980,000 people were a member of the Evangelical Church at the end of 2024. At the end of 2023 there were still 18,560,000. The Evangelical Church therefore lost 580,000 members.

Number of Catholics falls below the 20 million mark

According to preliminary figures from the German Bishops’ Conference, the number of Catholics was still 19,769.237 at the end of 2024. A year earlier it was 20,345,872 million. Accordingly, the Catholic Church lost 576,635 members. According to the figures, Catholics are now still 23.7 percent of the total population.

The number of church exits decreased compared to 2023, for the Protestants by 8.2 percent. In 2024, 345,000 people left the Evangelical Church. In the case of the Catholics, the number of church exits was according to the information at 321,611. In 2023, 402,694 Catholics of the Church turned their backs.

Another abnormality: the Archdiocese of Cologne by Cardinal Rainer Maria Woelki is no longer the diocese with the highest of members in Germany, but fell behind the diocese of Münster. According to the Statistics, the Archdiocese of Cologne still has 1.627 million members, Münster has 1.630 million.

Church lawyer criticizes “Totengräber” Woelki

It is no longer a matter of course today that people belong to a church, said Kirsten Fehr’s EKD council chairman. Accompaniment and pastoral care are increasingly important in the current times of confusing crises. “Our society is more dependent than ever that people are committed to civil society – also in church and diakonia,” said Fehrs.

The chairman of the German Bishops’ Conference, Georg Bätzing, admitted that the situation of the church in Germany was not easy and shaped by a great crisis. “We don’t want to gloss over anything, but we don’t want to become depressed either,” said Bätzing. “On the contrary: we face our responsibility. This also includes dealing with the crimes of sexual abuse.”

The Catholic Reform movement “We are Church” emphasized that the somewhat back number of church exits was not a trend reversal. Rather, the statistics are a “disturbing sign of the continuous shrinking process of the Roman Catholic Church in Germany”.

Catholic canon lawyer Thomas Schüller told the German Press Agency that today you have to justify why you stay in the church – and no more why you go. The church has not yet found a way to win new members. “The Catholic Church still manages its financial and political power too much, but forgets to authentically announce the gospel,” said Schüller. In the Archdiocese of Cologne you can see how a lack of credibility by the Archbishop Woelki is driving people out of the church in droves: “Such dead graves will continue to harm the church.”