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Financial contribution

Budget of the Catholic Church

The comprehensive budget of the Catholic Church can be estimated at 600 million euros. In 2004, 195 million euros was donated by the faithful and about 150 million euros was contributed by the parishes. Charitable works also have a high budget, for example, 117 million euros devoted to Catholic Aids (Secours Catholique), 25.7 million euros consecrated to Catholic Committee against Hunger and for Development (CCFD) and property belonging to religious congregations or the Catholic Teaching Association (enseignement catholique).
Since the separation of the church and the State in 1905, the main source of income for the Catholic Church has been donations made by the faithful: the main part of the Catholic Church’s budget comes from the collections among the believers.
Nowadays, even the smallest of all the dioceses is capable of contributing the largest portion of the revenue of the Catholic Church. This "quest money" allowed the dioceses to raise 195 millions euros in 2004; the parishes contributed 133 millions euros coming from of the parishes collections. Priests also shared the money given out as mass offerings (a sum of 57.72 million euros). 65.13 million euros given out as casual offerings, i.e., donations made by the faithful on the occasion of baptisms, weddings and funerals, are to be added.
The financial responsibility of the Church covers, first of all, the personnel and represents three quarters of the budget of the dioceses. The budget is used to pay wages of priests and in religious people on pastoral mission, and also more frequently, salaries of secular priests on pastoral mission. The Church is also responsible for the maintenance of religious edifices constructed after 1905. Most of the Churches built before 1905 are owned by the town municipality.

On this topic, see the article published in La Croix newspaper (in French).
See also a TNS-Sofres survey for Pèlerin et Via Magnificat, 9-28 September 2009, the French and donations to the Catholic church.

D 25 September 2012    AAnne-Laure Zwilling

CNRS Unistra Dres Gsrl

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