The Catholic Church in the USA

Click to enlarge

There are 68.1 million Catholics in the USA, making Catholics 22% of the U.S. population.
There are 41,489 diocesan and religious order priests, 60,715 religious sisters, 4,905 religious brothers and 16,935 permanent deacons.  As of 2010, there are 18,674 parishes, including 91 new parishes, and 189 seminaries with 4,973 students. There are 6,133 Catholic elementary schools and 1.6 million students. The country’s 1,341 Catholic high schools educate more than 674,000 students, while 234 Catholic colleges and universities serve more than 795,000 students. U.S. Catholic hospitals number 562 and serve almost 85.3 million patients, while 3009 Catholic social service centers assist 27.2 million people annually.

When the Catholic Church was founded, there were no hospitals. Today, one out of five people in this country receive their medical care at a Catholic hospital. When the Catholic Church was founded, there were no schools. Today, the Catholic Church teaches 3 million students a day in its more than 250 Catholic Colleges and Universities, its more than 1200 Catholic High Schools and its more than 5,000 Catholic Primary Schools. Every day the Catholic Church feeds, clothes, shelters and educates more people than any other organization in the world. Faithful Catholics donate millions of their own money to fund these programs.