04 July 2010

The Dozen Largest Orders by Number of Priests

The top 12 largest orders (by number of priests) in total are 51% of all the priests in orders. In the table below is the number of priests, % of all priests in orders, and the name of the order.
Priests%Order
13,09610%Society of Jesus
10,7808%Salesians of Saint John Bosco
10,1247%Order of Friars Minor
6,9445%Order of Friars Minor Capuchin
4,4663%Order of Friars Preachers
4,1433%Congregation of the Most Holy Redeemer
4,1153%Order of Saint Benedict
4,0473%Society of the Divine Word
3,1402%Oblates of Mary Immaculate
3,0682%Congregation of the Mission
2,9512%Order of Friars Minor Conventual
2,7252%Order of Discalced Carmelites
The next order in this sequence drops to only 2,187 priests. The top two dozen largest orders include all that have more than 1,000 priests. (Numbers based on the Annuario Pontificio 2010)