Sunday, August 19, 2012

The finances of the Catholic church

I'm sure it will come as a great shock, but The Economics reports that the Catholic church is not handling its money well.
[T]he finances of the Catholic church in America are an unholy mess. The sins involved in its book-keeping are not as vivid or grotesque as those on display in the various sexual-abuse cases that have cost the American church more than $3 billion so far; but the financial mismanagement and questionable business practices would have seen widespread resignations at the top of any other public institution.
According to Buce, who claims to be a former bankruptcy judge,
[O]ver and over again, the bishops engage in--and get away with-- stuff that would send them to the stony lonesome if they did them in the private sector, or at the very least, strip them of their employment or at least of their bankruptcy discharge. Commingling assets, shell-game moving of assets, misuse of trust fund taxes--this is stuff that causes real trouble to real people even in the highly forgiving realm of private-sector corporate America but not, it seems, for those who are so securely wrapped in the cloth of sanctity.

1 comment:

  1. As Father Ted would say: "The money was only resting in my account."

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