The Catholic Diocese of Peoria has seen a recent jump in attendance in its parishes.
Bishop Louis Tylka said the number of people participating in first communion and confirmation ceremonies at this year's Easter Vigil has doubled, and overall attendance has also significantly increased.
Other parishioners are those returning to the church after having previously left. Church attendance in the Diocese had fallen by nearly 50% over the last decade, prompting a reorganization and consolidation of parishes.
“This is all the work of the Holy Spirit working through people’s lives individually,” Tylka said in an interview on WGLT’s Sound Ideas.
“You have to give credit where credit’s due," he said. "It’s not something that I’m doing as bishop or priest…it’s God working in people’s lives and they’re discovering their hunger for the Lord.”
Tylka said some may be looking for guidance amid the problems, conflicts and chaos of the world because the church can provide stability.
He said that is true outside of his diocese as well.
“There’s growth in some synagogues and other places of worship, that people who are hungry for God are looking for a place to find home. And as a Catholic bishop, I want to invite everybody come home to the Catholic Church, but it’s good that people are searching for the Lord and finding places to help deepen that relationship,” he said.
Pope Leo XIV
One factor could be the arrival of a Chicago-native to the Vatican. Last year, the first American pope, Pope Leo XIV, began his papacy.
Tylka said it made many people more curious.
“I think what happens in our lives of faith is something kind of sparks us, right? And I would attribute that to the promptings of the Holy Spirit, but events happen in our lives and in the world…” Tylka said. “And so, seeing a South Sider from Chicago…to become the Pope, I think it sparked a lot of curiosity.”
Tylka said that curiosity about Pope Leo’s life and history may have led them to attending a service, to inspire the “embers of faith dwelling within us."
That being said, the election of the Pope is not purposeful as to coax a certain population to the church. The cardinals attending the Conclave chose not just the Pope from the South Side, but the Pope for the world, Tylka said.
“And throughout his life, he had many different experiences, both from Chicago and obviously time as a missionary in Peru, as a bishop in Peru, going to Rome and being called to be a cardinal and lead the dicastery for bishops,” said Tylka. “I think [the cardinals] were thinking about who is going to be the right man to lead the church for the next, God-willing, many years, to call the world to holiness, call the world to be a place of peace and justice.”
In his Palm Sunday address, the Pope rejected claims that God justifies war, NPR reports. U.S. officials, including Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, have used language casting the U.S.-Israeli military operations in Iran as a holy war.
Tylka said when speaking as the Vicar of Christ and the successor of the Saint Peter, the Pope is calling upon the entire world at once.
“Pope Leo is speaking out against war, is speaking to the world community, challenging all the nations of the world to seek ways of peace and justice, to end violence and war,” he said. “But it’s also a reality that we live in a country that is now in conflict in Iran, so we would be foolish to not hear that as a message that we need to hear and take to heart in our own country.”
'Hungry for connection'
Another curious group helping flesh out church attendance is young people. Tylka said it is another group asking bigger questions about their lives.
For instance, since the COVID-19 pandemic, he has seen young people want to use the church as a place for building community.
“A screen on a cell phone or a computer, it does not bring the same experience of actually being in a room with somebody and having a conversation with them and the tactile experience of somebody shaking a hand or giving a hug,” he said.
“So, I think young people are certainly hungry for connection and certainly seeking ways to find that in a good and healthy way, which is, of course, to build good relationships.”
The church has also grown amid a period of reorganization to account for these shifting populations. Tylka said that does not cause him to rethink long term prospects for the church.
“Part of the reason that we went through that years long process of self-examination and reorganization of our parish structures—part of the purpose was we want to be more missional,” he said. “We want to go out and encounter people and bring them into a relationship with Jesus and the Church.”
Tylka said if the church spends too much time supporting outdated structures, they would be failing in their service to the community.
“We’re adapting and changing out parish structures, both to provide what is necessary for us, a place to receive the sacraments, a place of community, but we’re also inviting people to think of that parish in a different way,” he said.
In one example, Tylka said a parish which closed one church, saw its two remaining ones host full masses from then on.
