In Europe, church taxes not
unusual
By JOHN L. ALLEN JR.
As the European Networks study of church finances unfolds,
it will face a striking diversity in European church/state relations -- ranging
from Frances strict Enlightenment-era separation of church and state to
Germanys generous church tax.
All 20 Catholic dioceses in Germany benefit from the
Kirchensteuer, or church tax, which amounts to 8 or 9
percent of taxable income. Protestant, Orthodox and Jewish wage-earners also
pay a church tax for their churches and synagogues.
In 1995, the latest figures available, the tax netted $4.7 billion
for the German Catholic church. A similar church tax is also assessed in
Austria and parts of Switzerland, though usually at lower rates.
Germanys constitution assigns the power to assess the church
tax to the churches themselves. State governments actually collect the tax only
because the churches contract with them to do so. Each of the 16 state
governments gets a share of the total collected, usually 3 or 4 percent, as
payment for administering the tax.
Germanys 28 million Catholics (out of a total population of
82 million) can avoid paying the tax only by formally leaving the church, a
move that technically means they can no longer receive the sacraments.
The German government also allocates funds for schools, hospitals,
day care centers and a wide variety of other social services delivered by the
church. The government pays for the preservation of historic buildings, which
includes many of the countrys parishes and cathedrals. Some states also
make other allocations to the church -- for example, Bavaria pays the salaries
of its bishops and members of cathedral chapters (the priests and deacons who
serve a cathedral) directly out of the public treasury.
A church tax of sorts is also collected in Italy and Spain, though
in both nations it takes the form of an optional checkoff. Spaniards (with
Roman Catholics estimated to be 99 percent of a population of 39.2 million) can
designate approximately 0.5 percent of their taxes to go either to the church
or to government programs for the needy. Less than half of Spanish taxpayers
opt for the church. In Italy taxpayers can designate 0.8 percent of their taxes
to go to the church or to government programs, and there almost 89 percent
choose the church.
In Belgium, where 75 percent of the population of 10.2 million are
Catholic, there is no church tax, but the government provides direct grants to
six denominations: Catholicism, Protestantism, Anglicanism, Judaism, Islam and
a catchall category of nondenominational.
Sweden, where Lutheranism is the state church, also has a church
tax; non-Lutherans pay what is known as a dissenters tax.
Political leaders there, however, plan to disentangle church and state sometime
after 2000. Finland collects a church tax for the Lutheran and Orthodox
churches. Greece funds the Orthodox church directly, and in England salaries
and pensions in the Anglican church are paid for out of revenue from extensive
landholdings.
National Catholic Reporter, January 29,
1999
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