Bishop Kieran Conry: Faithful often gradually "drift away"

(Vatican Radio) The Year of Faith will have a special significance for the English Diocese of Arundel & Brighton. Bishop Kieran Conry is using it to launch a four year programme leading up to the Diocesan Jubilee in 2015. Each year will be dedicated to a different major document of the Second Vatican Council, and hopefully lead to a deeper understanding of what it means to be Catholic in southern England in the 21^st century.
Bishop Conry is also a Synod Father at the XIII General Assembly of the Synod of Bishops on the New Evangelization.
He spoke to Vatican Radio about the problems facing the Church, especially with “lapsed” or “non-practicing” Catholics.
“It’s a problem everywhere,” he said. “It’s a problem that’s being addressed, although not sufficiently I think, so far in the Synod.”
He said the problem should be seen as a challenge.
“The first challenge is to know why have they gone? What didn’t we do for them?”
Bishop Conry told Vatican Radio that although in the past, people often left the Church because of specific issues, such as an argument with a priest, nowadays the reasons are less exact.
“Very often we find it’s not hostility, it’s not anything specific,” he explained. “It’s just a change of circumstances, and just a gradual drift away. People find they miss one Sunday for some reason, and then they miss it again, and suddenly they are missing it more often than not, and find they don’t miss it, as it were.”
Listen to Philippa Hitchen's full interview with Bishop Kieran Conry: