After a short period of growth in the 1970s, when 20,000 emigrants returned to Connacht, rural communities in the West continued to decline. In the 65 years up to 1991 Connacht and Donegal lost one fifth of its population. In the diocese there were villages and townlands where the total population between the ages of 20 and 35 could be counted on the fingers of one hand. Between 1986 and 1991 the rate of net emigration from the West more than doubled while births more than halved.