During the pandemic, the Pope sent medical equipment, including respirators, to high-risk areas, from Latin America to China. But where does the Pope get the money for these acts of charity?
He does so through Peter's Pence, donations from Catholics collected every June 29, the feast day of Sts. Peter and Paul, and considered “the Pope's day.”
Those funds go toward meeting the Pope and the Vatican's needs.
Pius IX launched the initiative in 1871. Though it was really born in the seventh century, with the conversion of the Anglo-Saxons, who, as a sign of loyalty to Rome, would send an annual contribution to the Pope. Back then it was called the “Denarius Sancti Petri.”
The latest report, from 2019, shows that Peter's Pence raised $64 million and financed charity projects and a third of the Pope and the Vatican Curia's activities.
In 2020 Peter's Pence collected about $14 million less, but expenses remained high.
In 2015, the fund had about $380 million; today it has about $245 million.
That's why Juan Antonio Guerrero Alves, who manages the Vatican's finances, says the numbers show that the Church's aid projects depend upon Catholics' contributions.
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