| Roman Catholics in The Netherlands [1] [2] |
|||||||
| year | population | Roman Catholics | percentage | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1970 | 5.320.000 | 40,5 | |||||
| 1980 | 5.620.000 | 39,5 | |||||
| 1990 | 5,560.000 | 37,0 | |||||
| 1995 | 15.493.889 | 5.385.258 | 34,8 | ||||
| 2000 | 15.987.075 | 5.060.413 | 31,6 | ||||
| 2005 | 16.335.509 | 4.406.000 | 27,0 | ||||
| 2006 | 16.357.992 | 4.352.000 | 26,6 | ||||
| 2007 | 16.405.000 | 4.311.000 | 26,3 | ||||
| 2008 | - | 4.267.000 | 25,9 | ||||
The Catholic Church in the Netherlands; Dutch: rooms-katholiek kerkgenootschap in Nederland (RKK), is part of the worldwide Catholic Church, under the spiritual leadership of the Pope and curia in Rome. Although the number of Catholics in the Netherlands has decreased significantly in recent decades, the Dutch Catholic Church is today the largest religious group in the Netherlands. Once known as a Protestant country, in 2007 Protestants made up only 16.8 percent of the Dutch population, considerably less than the 26 percent of Dutch Catholics in 2007. There are an estimated 4.267 million Catholics (31 December 2008) in the Netherlands, 25.9 percent of the population down from more than 40 percent in 1970's. The number of Catholics in the Netherlands continues to decrease, roughly by half a percent annually.
Sunday church attendance by Catholics has decreased in recent decades to less than 200,000 or 1.2 percent of the Dutch population in 2006 (source KASKI – the official Dutch Roman Catholic statistics source). More recent numbers for Sunday church attendance have not been published (with the exception of the diocese of Roermond), although press releases have mentioned a further decline since 2006.
There are seven dioceses in the Netherlands. Two of the three southern dioceses, the diocese of Den Bosch and the diocese of Roermond, are majority Roman Catholic.
For more demographic details by diocese, see the List of Roman Catholic dioceses of the Netherlands.
| Diocese | Church members | Church members as % of population | Number of Sunday churchgoers | Sunday churchgoers as % of population |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Groningen-Leeuwarden | 109.000 | 6,1 | 7.385 | 0,4 |
| Utrecht | 766.000 | 19,4 | 34.155 | 0,9 |
| Haarlem-Amsterdam | 475.000 | 16,9 | 26.605 | 0,9 |
| Rotterdam | 531.222 | 15,0 | 26.205 | 0,7 |
| Breda | 454.000 | 40,9 | 13.960 | 1,3 |
| 's-Hertogenbosch | 1.167.000 | 56,8 | 45.645 | 2,2 |
| Roermond (2008) [4] | 817.000 | 72,8 | 36.640 | 3,3 |
From the Reformation to the 20th century, Dutch Catholics had largely been confined to certain southern areas in the Netherlands where they still tend to form a majority or large minority of the population. However, with modern population shifts and increasing secularization, these areas tend to be less and less predominantly Catholic. Catholics still form a majority in the two southern provinces of the Netherlands, Noord-Brabant and Limburg (refer the overview by diocese above).
Historically In the old days, Catholics were treated as second class citizens.
After the Dutch Republic banned the Catholic religion in the 1580s the Netherlands became a Mission territory under the canonical authority of the Congregation for the Propagation of the Faith (the so-called Dutch Mission). The episcopal hierarchy was not restored until 1853.
In the late nineteenth and early twentieth Catholics formed a separate social pillar, with their own schools, TV and radio broadcasting, hospitals, unions, and political party. They formed a coalition with orthodox Protestants, who also felt discriminated against. This pillarization and coalition government was important in emancipating the Catholics from their social exclusion. In the period between 1860-1960 Roman Catholic church life and institutions flourished. This period is called "the rich Roman life" (Dutch: "Het Rijke Roomse leven"). During this period, the number of Catholics in the Dutch population grew to approximate parity with Protestants, as in Northern Ireland, Switzerland, and Germany.
In the 1980s and 1990s the church became polarized between conservatives, whose main organization was the Contact Roman Catholics, and liberals, whose main organization was the Eighth of May Movement, (Dutch: "Acht Mei-beweging") which was founded in 1985. The founding of the 8 May Movement was inspired by the disputes about the papal visit in that year to the Netherlands. The organization had a difficult relationship with the bishops. It was disbanded in 2003. In spite of that, tensions between conservative elements in the catholic church and more liberal elements have, as of 2011, not completely disappeared.[5]
Church adherence declined from 40% in 1970s to 26% in 2007.
Within the Netherlands the hierarchy consists of:
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