The number of priests in Italy has fallen 16.5% in 30 years, from 38,209 in 1990 to 31,793 in 2020, the Italian Bishops Conference (CEI) said Wednesday.
In the last 11 years alone the fall has been 11%, it said.
The drop has been offset by an increasing number f foreign priests coming to Italy, the CEI said.
"The data should not alarm us, but they must be taken into serious consideration," said the CEI's vocation office director, don Michele Gianola.
Almost one in 10 of priests in Italy are now foreign-born, the CEI said.
They have grown over ten-fold in the last 30 years, from 204 in 1990 to 2,631 in 2020.
In 1990 only 3.4% of priests in Italy were foreign while they were 8.3% in 2020.
The average age of priests in Italy has risen by 4.1% to 61.8 years in the last 20 years.
The average age of foreign priests in Italy is 46.7.
Priests under the age of 30 have dropped from 1,701 in 2000 to 599 in 2020, a fall of around 60%.
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