Patrick Comerford
I continue to be overwhelmed by the viewing and reading figures for this blog. These figures passed the 40 million by late this morning (28 March 2026), having passed 39 million mark last week (22 May 2026). These figures reached 38 million a week earlier (14 May 2026), 37 million the previous week (8 May 2026), 36 million six days before that (2 May 2026) and 35 million at the beginning of this month (1 May 2026). The figures have now passed the million mark six times so far this month, having passed that mark four times last month also: 34 million (29 April), 33 million (25 April), 32 million (19 April) and 31 million (8 April).
These viewing and reading figures are overwhelming, to say the least, and this blog continues to reach a volume of readers that I never have expected when I first started blogging 16 years ago. Half the total hits (20 million) have been within less than six months, having reached 20 million hits just over five months ago (18 December 2025). The total hits this month are my highest ever, with about 5.4 million so far in May 2026, compared with previous one-day highs in March 2026 (over 4.5 million) and April (almost 4.4 million). The figure of over 5.4 million so far this month is astonishing, considering it took almost 11 years, from July 2010 until 27 March 2021, to reach what I then thought was the staggering figure of 5 million hits.
At the end of last year, this blog had 21 million hits (31 December 2025). So far this year, there have been more than 19 million hits or visitors in 2026.
I first began blogging back in 2010, and it took almost two years until July 2012 to reach half a million readers. Throughout this year and last, the daily figures continue to be overwhelming on many occasions. Of the ten days of busiest traffic on this blog, three were this month (1, 6 and 14 May 2026), three were last month (26, 29 and 30 April 2026), three were in March, and one was in February:
• 1,124,925 (1 May 2026)
• 525,719 (14 May 2026)
• 509,644 (29 April 2026)
• 344,003 (30 April 2024)
• 323,156 (27 March 2026)
• 322,038 (26 April 2026)
• 318,835 (6 May 2026)
• 318,307 (1 March 2026)
• 314,018 (28 February 2026)
• 301,449 (2 March 2026)
The daily average is almost 190,000 throughout May, although that figure is distorted by the exceptionally high number of hits on three days this month. There were about 145,000 or more hits a day last month; ten years ago, in 2016, the daily average was around 1,000.
To put this latest figure of 40 million into perspective:
It is estimated that 40 million people live in Canada, Angola and Ukraine. The Kurds – about 40 million people spread largely across four countries in the Middle East, Turkey, Iraq, Syria and Iran – are the world’s largest ethnic group without an independent state of their own.
Back in 1898, the population of the UK was around 40 million. The Office for National Statistics (ONS), in its official population projections, estimates that the figure will reach 70 million this year (2026).
Britain's biggest chain of bookstores, Waterstones, sells 40 million books a year. There are 40 million vehicles on the roads in the UK.
40 million consumers in the UK plan to watch the World Cup on television this year, according to research by Appinio – although I decided a long time ago that I shall watch fixtures from Mexico or Canada but I am not going to watch any that are played in the US. It’s my own small gesture of protest against the horrors of the Trump administration.
Jodi Picoult, the best-selling author with more than 40 million books in print, faced threats of boycotts of her work after she posted her views on Charlie Kirk on social media last September. She said that Kirk had made a living out of preaching hate’. The author of My Sister’s Keeper, said: ‘An undeserved violent death does not negate the terrible pain that he inflicted on others.’
‘I’m not buying into the hypocrisy,’ Jody Picoult said. ‘You won’t trick me into believing it’s just about respect for life when your side has cheered families being ripped apart, when your side has proudly supported Alligator Alcatraz merch,’ the writer said, referring to the immigration detention centre opened by the Trump regime in Florida.
40 million metres are 40,000 km and 40 million square metres are 40,000 sq km. Denmark has a total area of approximately 43,000 sq km, with its actual land area, excluding inland waters, measuring exactly 40,000 sq km.
The Earth’s circumference, the distance around Earth, is just about 40,000 km or 40 million metres. Measured around the equator, it is 40,075.017 km, and measured passing through the poles the circumference is 40,007.863 km.
40 million minutes is approximately 76 years and 18 days. In other words, if this blog was getting only one hit a minute, it would take more than 76 years, from May 1950, almost two years before I was born, to reach today’s figure of 40 million.
I retired from active parish ministry over four years ago, on 30 March 2022. These days, though, about 120-140 people on average continue to read my daily prayer diary on this blog each morning. A similar number have been reading my recent series of postings on churches and local history in Staffordshire, and were reading my recent series of postings on the churches and chapels of Walsingham. I imagine many of my priest-colleagues would be prayerfully thankful if the congregations in their churches totalled 850 to 1,000 or more people each week.
This evening, I am truly grateful to the real readers among those 40 million hits on this blog to date, and in particular I am thankful for the faithful core group of 120-140 people who join me in prayer, reading and reflections each morning.
