Urban Fink: – kath.ch
The Catholic aid organization Domestic Mission received a fifth fewer donations in 2021. The pandemic is mainly due to shrinking church collections. Managing Director Urban Fink is now increasingly relying on private donations. And finds: There is a need for action in Valais.
Regula Pfeifer
“I assume that the collections will not return to the pre-pandemic level,” said Urban Fink at the general assembly of the Swiss Catholic Press Association. This took place on Saturday in the offices of the Inland Mission (IM) in Zofingen.
Zewo certification sought
Church collectives have declined by a quarter in the 2021 pandemic year. This situation is obviously putting pressure on the relief organization. “We have to get fitter,” says Urban Fink. He has private donations in mind to improve the financial situation of his aid organization. That is why IM is also aiming for Zewo certification.
The Domestic Mission has a long history. The historian and theologian Urban Fink reports on this. The Catholic relief organization was founded in 1863 with the aim of collecting money in the original Catholic countries in order to support Catholics in the diaspora.
© Christoph von Siebenthal
Urban Fink (standing) as host of the general meeting of the Swiss Catholic Press Association in Zofingen.
Help for Catholic Diaspora
The founder of the relief organization was the Zug doctor Johann Melchior Zürcher-von Deschwanden (1821-1902). He saw that the majority of lower-class Catholics were migrating. In the aspiring Reformed cantons, mission stations gradually emerged, and the resulting Catholic parishes. These have long been supported by the Inland Mission. Because the Catholic Church was not recognized by the state in the reformed cantons for a long time and was therefore unable to levy church taxes. In its heyday, the Inland Mission assists over 200 parishes and continues to support over 100 outstations.
“In 1963, Zurich was the last canton in German-speaking Switzerland to recognize the Catholic Church,” says Urban Fink. And so there was a “complete change”. Prosperous regional churches are now surging from what used to be poor parishes.
Help for mountain cantons, Ticino and western Switzerland today
Today, the IM primarily supports church institutions in the mountain cantons, in Ticino and in western Switzerland, especially in the cantons of Neuchâtel and Geneva, where church and state are separated. The church in the canton of Neuchâtel, which, according to Fink, is severely short of money, receives particular support. The IM also provides targeted support for pastoral care projects in Geneva and Freiburg.
The IM also provides help in Valais – for supra-parish tasks. The reason for this: There are no parishes with church taxes in Valais. No money flies from the parishes to the bishop. The parishes only finance their expenses with the help of the resident communities.
Need for action in Valais
The canton of Valais pays a contribution to the Diocese of Sion. “But together with the annual collection for the diocese of Sion that is collected on All Saints’ Day, that is not enough to finance all the diocese’s tasks,” says Urban Fink. There is a need for action when it comes to financing the diocese in Sion. Actually, it is not the task of the domestic mission to provide services that, as is customary elsewhere, should be co-financed by the parishes.
The aid organization based in Zofingen provides support in three areas, as Managing Director Urban Fink explains. She helps church communities and parishes with renovations. She supports central pastoral care projects and, in the priesthood, supports individual cases who are mostly dependent on financial help for health reasons.
© Catholic Media Center, 07/11/2022
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