What sparked this decline?

Its roots actually trace back to the 1960s, when a split developed over the reforms introduced by Pope John XXIII. Dismayed by the pope’s calls for more participation by laypeople in church affairs, many tradition-minded bishops and cardinals defended the centrality of Rome and frowned on the social activism of priests that was unleashed by the reforms, known as Vatican II. After Pope John’s death, in 1963, the traditionalists increased their power within the Vatican, culminating with the elevation of John Paul II to the papacy, in 1978. He undid many of his predecessor’s reforms, and millions of liberal Catholics drifted away, fed up with what they saw as Vatican authoritarianism as well as its unstinting opposition to abortion and artificial contraception.

Have the sex scandals hurt?

They’ve only accelerated the decline. In the mid-1990s, when the first wave of abuse charges surfaced, church attendance in the U.S. dropped, leveling off at around 35 percent of self-described Catholics. The new wave of scandals has perhaps struck an even deeper nerve, since it involves higher-level authorities—including Pope Benedict XVI himself—allegedly covering up abuses by allowing known pedophiles to continue to serve as priests and, in many cases, work with children. In Latin America, the church has been rocked by abuse scandals in Mexico and Brazil, even as it tries to stanch the flow of defectors to evangelical Protestant churches. In Germany, more than 1,200 people in just one city, Würzburg, quit the church in March, following a cascade of reports of sexual abuse and sadistic punishment of children in Catholic schools. In Ireland, government reports detailing decades of “endemic” abuse by clerics have turned many young people away from the church. “How can you believe in religion with all this going on?” asks Dubliner Adam Cunningham, 18.

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Addition by subtraction
Not every Catholic is troubled by the church’s dwindling membership. According to some conservative priests and thinkers, the sex scandals and conflicts with the Vatican have shaken out the fair-weather believers. The conservatives want a return to the Latin Mass and an end to challenges to the Vatican’s authority. A return to tradition would likely result in “a smaller but much more fervent and evangelizing church,” says the Rev. John McCloskey, a former Wall Street executive who’s an outspoken advocate of the traditionalist movement. The shrinkage would be only temporary, he says, since as liberals left the church, it would be strengthened by the core of tradition-minded Catholics who obey the church’s ban on contraceptives and rear large families. Such families would inevitably produce more sons, some of whom would enter the priesthood. Thanks to a conservative renaissance, says McCloskey, “the church in America may well be on the cusp of a more vibrant era.”