Is interest in Catholicism dropping?

By one measure, the answer appears to be: yes.

Online queries about Catholicism have taken a measurable plunge over the last several years, as the graph below indicates (click to enlarge).

CARA has details:

Searchers from the United States for anything with the term “Catholic” in them have dropped significantly in the 2004 to 2011 period (e.g., Catholic school, Catholic Church, Catholic Charities). The graph above shows weekly search volumes in Google (which dominates the search industry)…

…There is a clear and repetitive pattern in the graph. Searches for anything Catholic reach a low point each summer and peak in two weeks each year—weeks for Ash Wednesday and Christmas. The only outlier here is the significant increase in searches surrounding the death of Pope John Paul II and the conclave that selected Pope Benedict XVI. In 2007, the search volumes dip below average for the period and have continued on a downward pace to date. The decline is linear. Americans are significantly less likely to search for anything Catholic than they were seven years ago.

There’s much more at the CARA blogsite. Check it out.