Sacramento, Calif., Aug 25, 2009 / 23:31 pm
Hoping to encourage at least 100,000 non-practicing Catholics to return to church, the Diocese of Sacramento is preparing a “come home” advertising campaign for this December and January.
At Mass over the next several weeks, church leaders will outline the program and ask parishioners to help pay for the ads. The ads are produced by the Catholics Come Home project.
"There's a large number of people who have left the church and are waiting for an invitation to come back," Msgr. James Murphy, vicar general of the diocese, told the Sacramento Bee. "This is their invitation."
The diocese has an estimated population of 950,000 Catholics, but only about 136,500 attend weekly Mass.