Joselito Cerna Asis knew that moving to Melbourne from the Philippines to become a chaplain would come with some big changes. But he wasn't prepared for one particular aspect of the culture shock he felt — namely, that priests are treated very differently in Australia.
"We are all spoiled in the Philippines … [Parishioners] treat the priest just like they're a king.
"There are volunteers to clean the church, to take care of the priests, to cook, to do the laundry, to be the drivers."
In Australia, priests are expected to do many of these tasks, Monsignor Asis says, and he's taken up such responsibilities gladly.
His move to Australia tells the story of a wider trend.
Monsignor Asis is among the 1.37 million Catholic immigrants who has helped temper Catholicism's precipitous decline in Australia.
In Australia, the percentage of Catholics reached a peak in 1991 at 27.3 per cent of the population.
Today, that figure has sunk to 20 per cent, according to the latest census — the lowest since the 1930s Depression.
Of those numbers, just 8 per cent — roughly 417,000 people — attend church on an average weekend, 2021 figures from the National Centre for Pastoral Research show.
And while Catholicism remains the biggest Christian denomination in Australia, this is in no small part thanks to immigrants, which make up 27 per cent of Australia's Catholic population.
Here, the Philippines has played an outsized role. The number of Filipino-born Catholics in Australia trebled in just one generation, from less than 62,000 in 1991 to 216,000 in 2021, propelling the Philippines to the top-ranked birthplace for Australia's overseas-born Catholics.
But while Australian Catholicism may owe a debt to its immigrant followers, Monsignor Asis says Australia has deeply shaped him, too.
"I cannot insist that, 'I am a priest, and you should give me service or respect,'" the 64-year-old says.
"I have to serve other people. That's the great lesson from working in Australia."
It's a learning also embodied by Pope Francis — the late leader who earned a reputation for being a man of the people — he says.
"When [Pope Francis] went to the Philippines … and he ascended from the airplane, he was the one carrying his own luggage. This taught me a lot."
The changing face of Catholicism
In 1991, European-born Catholics outnumbered Asian-born Catholics by a factor of three. Thirty years later, that figure has halved.
According to Ruth Powell, director of National Church Life Survey (NCLS) Research, one in 10 convicts that arrived were Catholic. "You start with an underdog story, an oppressed story," she explains.
War was a catalyst for change.
"In those post-war years, about half the new arrivals — more than a million people — were Catholics, mainly from Southern Europe," says Bob Dixon, the founding Director of the National Centre for Pastoral Research.
"In the decades after the war, the Australian Catholic Church morphed from its predominantly Irish character to a multicultural, and increasingly Asian, one."
But it's not just congregations that have become more diverse. The leadership too, has changed.
It is estimated that between 40 and 50 per cent of diocesan priests in Australia were born in non-English speaking countries.
"Generally speaking, priests who came from Ireland, Italy and Malta arrived in Australia many years ago, whereas those who have come from places like Vietnam, India, the Philippines and Nigeria arrived much more recently," says Dr Dixon.
But while the church has opened its leadership — in a clerical sense — to migrant communities, these doors remain closed to another important group of followers: women.
Catholic women have outnumbered Catholic men since the 1970s.
This imbalance has continued to worsen, reaching its starkest level in 2021, when there were just 89 Catholic men per 100 Catholic women.
This is a reversal from the first half of the 20th century, when Catholic men outnumbered Catholic women.
However, the imbalance in favour of men was never as pronounced — it peaked at 103.7 men per 100 women in 1954.
But while women now dominate at the parish level — at least in terms of numbers — this hasn't been matched at a church leadership level.
A 2022 survey of this demographic found that 70 per cent believed women should be fully included at all levels of church leadership.
In fact, older female respondents were more supportive of reform — even radical reform — than their younger counterparts.
And when it comes to gender-based reform, the question of whether women should be allowed into the priesthood remains one of the most controversial, and widely discussed.
Canberra retiree Beth Gibson has been attending Catholic churches since her childhood. Although her involvement has "waxed and waned" over the decades, Gibson now facilitates a book club at her parish and regularly plays mass music, alongside her husband.
She wonders why Pope Francis — who emphasised the importance of recognising women's contributions — did not support such a move.
Ultimately, she believes the role and status of priests needs to be redefined first.
"[Priests play] an important role, but it's only one role within our community, and I think we need to move away from that [hierarchical] structure."
The age-old dilemma
But while congregants represent the heart of the church, there's no denying that younger generations are increasingly absent from that picture.
When Gibson, her husband Brendan, and their three daughters used to attend mass in the early 1990s, there were many families like them.
Now, on an average Sunday, "you can count children on one hand, if you're lucky," she says.
In 1921, just 15 per cent of Catholics were 50 or older, and Catholics had a younger age profile than the general population.
A century later, the tables have turned: about 40 per cent of Catholics in 2021 were aged 50 or older, compared to about 35 per cent of the general population.
Despite the ageing of the church, Gibson doesn't see the situation as "doom and gloom".
"I think a lot of kids and families are getting their spiritual experience and exposure through schools," she says.
In 2022, 794,000 — or one in five Australian students — attended Catholic schools.
Next generation Catholicism
While congregants are increasingly older, there are youthful pockets in parishes across the country.
Twenty-two-year-old Julian Vieira, who works for the Catholic Archdiocese of Sydney, believes the church is "really alive with young people".
He points to a recent gathering he attended with 30-odd young Catholics in the city's inner-west.
The cohort gather for regular dinners with local priests, chatting about life and faith, then joining in adoration and prayer.
"It's super casual," says Vieira.
"You just rock up. There's a group chat. We get chicken and chips."
Modern technology might make organising easier, but Vieira says age-old religious rituals are also resonating with Gen Zs, describing Latin Mass as "booming".
"They're looking for meaning, they're looking for purpose.
"In the 21st century, we have everything that we could ever desire … but there's still this hunger where people are looking for more."
Beth Gibson says she re-evaluated her expectations after spending time away from the church, then coming back into its fold.
"I suppose I stopped …. expecting this very human organisation to be perfect," she says.
She doesn't think the church will ever go back to bustling with bodies on a Sunday.
But to her, that doesn't matter.
"I think it will be a small group for whom this particular way of being makes sense and gives them something deeper … a sense of community, but also purpose and meaning in their life," she says.
"That may never be a whole stack of people, because these days there are lots of other [spiritual] options which are just as valid, just as important."
Credits
Reporting: Siobhan Marin
Data: Inga Ting
Development: Thomas Brettell
EDITOR'S NOTE: An earlier version of this article attributed photos of Bishop Rene Ramirez as Monsignor Joselito Cerna Asis. These were incorrectly supplied to the ABC.
Posted, updated
