The Catholic Church in Austria is part of the worldwide Catholic Church in full communion with the Pope in Rome. The Church's governing body in Austria is the Austrian Conference of Catholic Bishops, made up of the hierarchy of the two archbishops (Vienna and Salzburg), the bishops and the abbot of territorial abbey of Wettingen-Mehrerau. Nevertheless, each bishop is independent in his own diocese, answerable only to the Pope. The current president of the Conference of Catholic Bishops is Cardinal Christoph Schönborn. The Austrian church is the largest Christian Confession of Austria, with 4.64 million members (50.6 % of the total Austrian population) in 2023.[1]
 Catholic Church in Austria | |
|---|---|
| Austrian German: Katholische Kirche in Österreich | |
.JPG) | |
| Type | National polity |
| Classification | Catholic |
| Orientation | Latin |
| Polity | Episcopal |
| Governance | Episcopal Conference of Austria |
| Pope | Pope Francis |
| Chairman | Franz Lackner |
| Primas Germaniae | Franz Lackner |
| Apostolic Nuncio | Pedro López Quintana |
| Region | Austria |
| Language | German, Latin |
| Headquarters | Vienna, Austria |
| Members | 4.638.842 (50.6 %) (2023) |
| Official website | Episcopal Conference of Austria |
For more than 50 years, however, the proportion of Catholics has decreased, primarily due to secularization and migration (from 89% in 1961 to 52% in 2022). The number of Sunday churchgoers in 2021 was around 3.1 percent (as percentage of the total Austrian population that is 281,131 churchgoers out of a total population of 8,978,929).
Although Austria has no primate, the archbishop of Salzburg is titled Primus Germaniae (Primate of Germany).
Organisation
edit| Main Churches in Austria [2][1][3] | |||||||
| year | population | Catholics | % | Protestants | % | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1951 | 6,933,905 | 6,170,084 | 89.0% | 429,493 | 6.2% | ||
| 1961 | 7,073,807 | 6,295,075 | 89.0% | 438,663 | 6.2% | ||
| 1971 | 7,491,526 | 6,548,316 | 87.4% | 447,070 | 6,0% | ||
| 1981 | 7,555,338 | 6,372,645 | 84.3% | 423,162 | 5,6% | ||
| 1991 | 7,795,786 | 6,081,454 | 78.0% | 388,709 | 5.0% | ||
| 2001 | 8,032,926 | 5,915,421 | 73.6% | 376,150 | 4.7% | ||
| 2011 | 8,408,121 | 5,403,722 | 64.3% | 319,752 | 3.8% | ||
| 2021 | 8,979,894 | 4,827,683 | 53.8% | 270,585 | 3.0% | ||
| 2022 | 9,104,772 | 4,733,085 | 52.0% | 263,627 | 2.9% | ||
| 2023 | 9,158,750 | 4,638,842 | 50.6% | 255,738 | 2.8% | ||
Ecclesiastical structure
edit
- Archdiocese of Vienna with the following suffragan dioceses:
- Archdiocese of Salzburg with the following suffragans
- Territorial Abbey of Wettingen-Mehrerau (immediately subject to the Holy See)
- Military Ordinariate of Austria (immediately subject to the Holy See)
List of Catholic organisations in Austria
editStatistics
edit71% of Austrian Catholics support same-sex marriage and 26% oppose it.[4]
Criticism
editCall to Disobedience organization
editThe organization Call to Disobedience (Aufruf zum Ungehorsam in German) is an Austrian movement mainly composed of dissident Catholic priests which started in 2006. The movement claims that it is "positively received" by the majority of Austrian Catholic priests[5] and favors ordination of women, married and non-celibate priesthood, allowing Holy Communion to remarried divorcees and non-Catholics which disagrees with teachings of the Catholic Magisterium. The group also believes the way the Church is governed needs reform.[5]
Notable people
edit- Mozart
- Emerich Coreth
- Leopold III, Margrave of Austria
- Heinrich Maier, important resistance fighter against Nazi terror
- Gregor Mendel
- Zacharias Traber
- Franz Wasner
See also
editReferences
edit- ^ a b Catholic Church, Statistical Data 2003 - 2023 in German, retrieved 30 September 2024
- ^ Austrian Population, retrieved 30 September 2024
- ^ Lutheran Church, Statistical Data 2023 in German, retrieved 30 September 2024
- ^ How Catholics around the world see same-sex marriage, homosexuality Pew Research Center
- ^ a b The Catholic Tipping Point, old page version at archive.org