A record number of people left the German Catholic Church in 2022, the German Bishops’ Conference (DBK) said on Wednesday.
A total of 522,821 people ended their official relationship with the church, surpassing the record broken in the previous year when 359,338 people left.
The departures follow a series of child abuse scandals that have rocked the church in Germany, and elsewhere.
Even though more and more people are leaving the church, there are still 20.94 million people — just under a quarter of Germany’s population — who are registered members of the church.