It is no secret that the church has to make savings in times of thousands leaving the church and declining church tax revenues. Energy costs are now putting church institutions under pressure. The Bavarian bishops are sounding the alarm.
Munich (dpa / lby) - Bavaria's Catholic bishops are preparing for financially difficult times. "It's all going to get violent," said the chairman of the Freising Bishops' Conference, Cardinal Reinhard Marx, on Thursday in Munich. "You can neither increase church taxes nor go into debt," stressed the Archbishop of Munich and Freising.
The bishops did not prescribe any cuts for the 2023 budget for the so-called supradiocesan fund (ÜDF), from which the dioceses jointly finance the Catholic universities in the Free State, for example, but a zero round. "But then there are losses. You have more expenses," said Marx. "If I announce a zero round, it's a reduction."
Above all, the high energy costs are currently causing problems for church institutions. He hopes "that we don't have to take on excessive financial burdens from church taxes here," said Marx, and appealed to politicians: "We hope that the Free State will give us strong support here, otherwise it will be difficult for many institutions."
The bishops of the seven Catholic Bavarian dioceses of Bamberg, Würzburg, Eichstätt, Regensburg, Augsburg, Passau, Munich and Freising are represented in the Freising Bishops' Conference - as well as, for historical reasons, the bishop of the Speyer diocese. According to the German Bishops' Conference (DBK), there were around six million Catholics in Bavaria in 2021 and the trend is continuing to fall.
"If the trend continues, it will not be possible to keep everything going," Marx stressed. "If the budgets in the dioceses decrease, and I see that as a clear line ahead of me in the next ten years, then we have to talk to each other" - and clarify "how we can secure our institutions in a sustainable way". It must also be about “opening up new sources of finance”. Using the example of the universities, Marx spoke of increased raising of third-party funds for research. "Clear cut and gone, that's not a concept," said Marx, emphasizing that without income from church taxes, "many things would not happen in this country."
