"Where God is, there is the future"

Sandro Magister reports on the Pope's upcoming visit to Germany (which begins tomorrow) and the state of Christianity in that country:

ROME, September 21, 2011 – "Where God is, there is the future": this is the title that Benedict XVI wanted to give to his third visit to Germany, which begins tomorrow.

Pope Benedict has stated repeatedly that the "priority" of this pontificate is to bring men closer to God. But the case of Germany makes this urgency of his all the more compelling.

The former East Germany, together with Estonia and the Czech Republic, is the area of Europe where atheists are most numerous, and the non-baptized are in the majority.

In Berlin and in Erfurt, the city of Luther, pope Joseph Ratzinger will enter into precisely this perimeter of maximum estrangement from the faith, in Europe.

But also in Freiburg im Breisgau, the third stage of his voyage, the weakening of the Christian faith is a widespread phenomenon.

A book was recently released in Germany, published by GerthMedien, that analyzes the decline of Christianity in this country in very straightforward terms.

The title itself is eloquent: "Gesellschaft ohne Gott. Risiken und Nebenwirkungen der Entchristlichung Deutschlands [Society without God. Risks and side effects of the dechristianization of Germany]."

The author is Andreas Püttman, 47, a researcher at the Konrad Adenauer foundation as a sociologist of cultural processes, a former recipient of the Katholischen Journalistenpreis, the prize for journalism awarded by the German Catholic media.

Not only in the east, but in all of Germany less than half of the population, 47 percent, claims to believe in God.

From 1950 until today, the number of Protestants has collapsed from 43 to 25 million. While there were 25 million Catholics in 1950 and the same number today, many of these also falling by the wayside.

While in 1950 one out of two Catholics went to Mass every Sunday, today in the western part of the country only 8 percent go. In the former East Germany, where Catholics are a small minority, the figure is 17 percent.

Read the entire essay on the Chiesa site.