Patrick Comerford
I continue to be overwhelmed by the viewing and reading figures for this blog. These figures reached 46 million by mid-morning this morning (9 August 2026). Last month, the readership figures passed the million mark three times: 45 million 11 days ago (29 July), 44 million less than a fortnight earlier (16 July 2026), and 43 million 12 days before that (4 July 2026).
These viewing and reading figures are overpowering at time, with this blog continuing to reach volumes of readers I never expected when I first started blogging 16 years ago. At the end of last year, this blog had 21 million hits (31 December 2025). So far this year, there have been more than 25 million hits or visitors in 2026 alone, and almost 740,000 hits already this month.
Half of all hits or reader figures have been within the past six months, with 23 million hits since 12 February 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 in May (1, 6 and 14 May 2026), three were the previous month (26, 29 and 30 April 2026), three in March, and one in February:
• 1,124,925 (1 May 2026)
• 525,719 (14 May 2026)
• 509,644 (29 April 2026)
• 344,003 (30 April 2026)
• 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 was over 187,000 throughout May, but that figure was distorted by the exceptionally high number of hits on three days. There was an average of almost 88,000 hits a day last month, and an average of about 82,000 a day so far this month. Yet, ten years ago, in 2016, the daily average was around 1,000.
To put this latest figure of 46 million into perspective:
Iraq has a population of over 46 million and an area of 438,317 sq km, making it the 31st most populous in the world and the 58th largest country by area. The populations of both Argentina and Algeria are also estimated at 46 million, although that depends on who is counting, and how they count.
The Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church, the largest Oriental Orthodox Christian church, has an estimated 60 million members, with 46 million members in Ethiopia. It is in communion with the Eritrean Orthodox Tewahedo Church, the Coptic Orthodox Church of Alexandria, the Malankara Orthodox Syrian Church, the Armenian Apostolic Church and the Syriac Orthodox Church.
Methodism, including the Holiness Movement, is estimated to have about 46 million members worldwide.
Most figures suggest there are 46 million Muslims in Europe, representing about 6% of the continent’s total population of about 745 million.
There are 46 million people of African origin living outside their country of birth, matching population figures such as the pre-conflict population of Sudan and regional displacement tallies. They include 25 million living in another African country, 11 million in Europe and 10 million in other regions around the world.
More than 46 million foreign visitors have visited Spain in the first six months of the year, 4.6% more than in the same period last year, and Spain is on course for a record-breaking 100 million tourists this year. Belgium had a record number of tourists in 2025, with more than 46 million overnight stays registered across the country.
The Trump administration is cancelling direct federal funding of community-based organisations that work on HIV prevention. It is latest step in his push to eliminate funding for DEI-focused initiatives that help the LGBTQ community, but directly runs against the White House’s push to end the HIV epidemic by 2030. It means the loss of $46 million in funding for 96 community-based organisations to provide HIV testing, linkage to care, referrals for pre- and post-exposure drug treatment and outbreak response.
46 million minutes is equal to 87 years, 6 months and 9 days, assuming a standard calendar baseline of 365 days per year and 30 days per month. But factoring in variables such as leap days and the actual number of days in a month, the total comes to about 87 years, 5 months and 18 days. In other words, if this blog was getting only one hit a minute,, I would have had to start blogging around January or February 1939, before World War II started.
I retired from active parish ministry over four years ago, on 30 March 2022. These days, though, about 120 people on average are reading my daily prayer diary posted on this blog each morning. I imagine many of my priest-colleagues would be prayerfully thankful if the congregations in their churches totalled 800-900 or more people each week.
This evening, once again, I am truly grateful to the real readers among those 46 million hits on this blog to date, and in particular I am thankful for the faithful core group of 150 or so people who join me in prayer, reading and reflections each morning.
