A fourth of all European seminarians are Polish

About a quarter of all young men training to become Roman Catholic priests in Europe are Polish.

And Polish priests are increasingly in demand to plug the gaps in the rest of the continent.

At the seminary in Lublin, in south-eastern Poland, there are 171 young men preparing for the priesthood.

They are among 7,131 from all over the country.

Compare that to traditionally Catholic Spain. Its population is similar to Poland’s, but in 2001 it had fewer than 1,800 seminarians.