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Over 500,000 members leave the German Catholic Church in one year. This is the reason

2023-06-30 17:59:08Kosova&Bota SHKRUAR NGA REDAKSIA VOX
Over 500,000 members leave the German Catholic Church in one year. This is the
Over 500,000 members leave the German Catholic Church in one year

In Germany, the Catholic Church has revealed that it is losing followers like never before.

More than half a million people decided to give up their membership last year.

According to the Bonn-based German Bishops' Conference, 522,821 people left the church in 2022, a number far greater than the institution's own projections and higher than most observers had expected.

The previous record year for departures was in 2021, when just under 360,000 people left.

The church has 21 million members, according to 2022 figures, amounting to 24.8 percent of the population.

The speed of the departures, fueled by a series of child abuse scandals and allegations of a widespread cover-up, has shocked the clergy.

According to evidence gathered by the authorities, it appears to have accelerated further since the publication of an expert report on abuse in the archdiocese of Munich and Freising, and the discussion about the perceived involvement in the scandal of Pope Benedict XVI, who has died.

Last year there were legal battles over compensation payments to abuse victims in Cologne and Traunstein, as well as allegations that Cardinal Rainer Maria Woelki lied about what he knew about abuse cases.

Woelki, who was at the center of police raids this week on properties linked to the church, including his own residence, denies the allegations.

The Protestant church, which has also been embroiled in abuse scandals, has similarly lost members at an alarming rate, with 380,000 people leaving in 2022.

According to last year's figures, it has 19.5 million members in Germany.

The departures mean a significant loss of income for the church.

All Germans who declare an affiliation with the Protestant, Catholic and Jewish faiths are officially registered as such with their local authorities.

They are required to pay Kirchensteuer or Kultursteuer (church tax or cultural tax), which is between 8 percent and 9 percent of a person's income tax and is taken from their monthly income by the tax office, and which passes it to the relevant body.

And those who wish to leave must formally renounce their membership, a process known as Kirchenaustritt, or withdrawal from the church, by actively visiting the local registry office and paying an administrative fee of 30 euros.

The church tax was first enshrined in German law in 1919 and reaffirmed in the Reichskoncordat between Nazi Germany and the Vatican in 1933. It was reaffirmed in law again in 1949.


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