Peter's Pence Controversy

Until we can be certain that Peter's Pence is being used for charitable purposes and not for 'wheeling & dealing', no Catholic should contribute to it!

From the Lepanto Institute

By Rob Gasper

According to the USCCB’s second collection schedule, the Peter’s Pence collection is normally taken the last weekend in June.  The schedule says:

“The Peter’s Pence Collection enables the Holy Father to respond with emergency financial assistance to requests to aid the neediest throughout the world—those who suffer as a result of war, oppression, and natural disasters. It likewise provides the faithful with a tangible opportunity to not only empower the weak, defenseless, and voiceless, but also sustain those who suffer.”

The problem is that funds from Peter’s Pence have long been reputed to have been used for matters unrelated to its mission in assisting the poor.  In 1987, CNN reported that Vatican City used $50 million intended to assist the poor to make up for a budgetary shortfall in the City-State’s governing finances.  From the report:

“Last year the Holy See, the administrative center of the Church and the spiritual capital of its members, took in $57.3 million from sources as diverse as fees for ceremonies; income from publications, newspaper ads, and the sale of videocassettes; and surprisingly modest investment earnings of $18 million. With investments of some $500 million, the Vatican commands fewer financial resources than many U.S. universities. But the Holy See spent nearly twice as much as its income, $114 million. Covering half the shortfall was Peter’s Pence, a term that covers an annual collection for the Pope taken up in parishes around the globe as well as gifts made directly to the Pope by various donors. Formerly the Peter’s Pence money went to charities and missions. To bridge the gap, the Vatican dipped into reserves composed of Peter’s Pence contributions from prior years. With nearly $50 million spent since 1984, these reserves are almost gone. Using donations once destined for the poor to rent computers and pay salaries rankles the Church’s hierarchy. Says Gerald Emmett Cardinal Carter of Toronto: ”I don’t like the idea that the Pope has to spend his own money to balance the budget.” To make matters worse, the Holy See’s main stopgap source of income — Peter’s Pence — is a victim of the falling dollar. A third of Peter’s Pence, traditionally collected on the feast of Saint Peter in late June, comes from the U.S. The dollar’s steep slide against the lira is cutting into the proceeds.” (emphasis added)

Rumors have persisted since 1987 that funds collected for Peter’s Pence were being used outside of its intended and stated purpose.  In 2015, a book by Italian journalist Gianliugi Nuzzi reported that only 20% of the funds collected for Peter’s Pence in 2012 was used for charitable purposes, while the rest was used for “the maintenance” of the Roman Curia or went to a reserve fund controlled by the Vatican Secretariat of State.  Also from the article:

“Twenty years ago, when the Vatican announced it had a budget surplus for 1993 — the first in 23 years — officials said were particularly pleased that they no longer had to use all of Peter’s Pence to cover a deficit in operating expenses. U.S. Cardinal Edmund C. Szoka, the now-deceased president of the Prefecture for the Economic Affairs of the Holy See, thanked contributors at the time and said the funds could now go toward papal charities and other projects.”

The conclusion here is that at least from 1987-1993, Peter’s Pence funds were not being used for the purpose for which the funds were collected, and despite the public statement claiming otherwise in 1993, the misuse of those funds had continued.

These rumors were again confirmed in October of 2019 when Crux reported that $200 million from Peter’s Pence funds had been used for the “purchase of a swanky 183,000-square-foot apartment building in the Chelsea district of London.”  The report in the Italian news publication L’Espresso claimed that “hundreds of millions of Euro destined for the least and the poor are still administered opaquely and with no transparency, as if the Vatican were a merchant bank in an offshore country.”

From the article:

According to the report published Sunday, the Secretariat of State, the Vatican’s ultra-powerful coordinating department, controls roughly $725 million in funds off the books related to the annual “Peter’s Pence” collection, which is designed to allow individual Catholics to contribute to the pope’s charitable activities.

In fact, according to Fittipaldi’s report, most of those funds are instead diverted into “reckless speculative operations,” with 77 percent of the Peter’s Pence collections entrusted to Credit Suisse, the multinational financial services and investment company founded in Switzerland.

L’Espresso cites Vatican investigators charging that the use of those funds, roughly $560 million, has been marked by “garish irregularities” and “worrying scenarios.”

On December 6, 2019, National Catholic Register reported that $1 million from Peter’s Pence had been used to invest in the sexually-graphic, homosexual biopic of Elton John, Rocketman.  Another $3.6 million from Peter’s Pence was invested in the science fiction film, Men in Black: International.  The article also mentions that Gianluigi Nuzzi, in his new book, Giudizio Universale (Last Judgement), wrote that:

“according to Cardinal Angelo Becciu, former deputy of the Secretariat of State, only 10%-15% of Peter’s Pence goes to charity. The rest, he said, is used to fund the maintenance of Church structures. Nuzzi’s book reveals that much is opaque, assets are mismanaged, and the annual contribution by the faithful to Peter’s Pence is declining.”

On December 7, 2019, Catholic News Agency reported that Peter’s Pence funds were tied up in an international money laundering scheme.  From the article:

Italian newspaper Corriere della Serra reported that the Centurion Global Fund has raised around 70 million euro in cash, and that the Holy See’s Secretariat of State is the source of at least two-thirds of the fund’s assets. The Vatican’s investment is reported to include funds from the Peter’s Pence collection, intended to support charitable works and the ministry of the Vatican Curia.

A few days later, the Wall Street Journal reported that between 2014-2019, only about 10% of the money collected for Peter’s Pence had been used for the work of charity, while roughly two-thirds of the money had been used to help cover the budget deficit at the Holy See.

At the beginning of July, 2024, The Pillar Catholic reported that the vast majority of funds being collected for Peter’s Pence are going to Vatican operations, rather than to the charitable causes they advertise.  From the Pillar:

Allocations for “direct assistance to those most in need,” charitable projects picked by the pope, totaled 13 million euros in 2023, spread across 236 projects in 76 countries. Of the 103 million given out by Peter’s Pence last year, the report says, 90 million (87%) went to funding the operations of the Roman curia.

In 2022, 16.2 million went to charitable projects, versus 77.6 million euros which went to funding Vatican departments.

CONCLUSION: Given the published history of scandalous handling of money from the Peter’s Pence collection, it is perfectly reasonable for any faithful Catholic to be concerned that his participation in the Peter’s Pence collection would contribute to the corrupt and immoral use of said funds.  Until this is shown to be otherwise, we are marking Peter’s Pence as “Not Safe” for Catholic donations.