Why Catholic schools are shutting their doors | Grand Haven Tribune: The effects ripple through communities as schools and the parishes that support them lose members. They are often buckling under the pressures of declining enrollment and a weak economy.
Several challenges facing the church, in addition to a faltering economy, help to explain why so many schools are closing. Society is more secularized and there is a decline in the church-going population. The priest sex abuse scandal has kept the church in the news — and in court — for many years. And there have been demographic shifts in America's Catholic landscape, including immigrants who are Catholic but who do not put a priority on a Catholic education.
