Church finances stronger –
at home and in Rome
By Robert Delaney of The Michigan Catholic
Published June 4, 2004
Wherever Cardinal Edmund C. Szoka has served during his episcopal ministry, he has left a legacy of fiscal responsibility that has left the Catholic Church in better financial health – in his first diocese, Gaylord, then in the Archdiocese of Detroit, and later at the Vatican.
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| Cardinal Edmund C. Szoka talks about the Catholic Services Appeal, which he started to replace the Archdiocesan Development Fund. The program not only solved the archdiocese's financial deficit, but also financially benefits parishes which exceed their goals. | Cardinal Szoka has become known for his ability to face squarely the reality of a financial situation and then implement a solution.
When he became the first bishop of Gaylord in 1971, he had to organize a diocesan structure from scratch. He operated out of a small space in St. Mary High School in Gaylord until the new St. Mary Cathedral, rectory and parish hall could be built to serve the Church in those 21 northern Michigan counties.
As the new archbishop of Detroit in 1981, he took over a much larger diocese, but one with a serious problem. Support for the old Archdiocesan Development Fund had fallen, and archdiocesan reserve funds were being used to make up the deficit.
After assessing the situation, Cardinal Szoka decided to replace the ADF, in which parish participation had been optional, with the Catholic Services Appeal, modeled after the system he established in the Gaylord Diocese. All Catholics throughout the archdiocese would be asked to make a pledge to the CSA to support the ministries of the Church.
An overall goal was set, and individual targets were reckoned for every parish. Unlike the ADF, parishes were required to participate; if parishioners did not respond with enough in pledges, the parish would have to meet the target from its own revenue.
But if there was a stick to compel participation, there was also a carrot to encourage it. Anything collected above and beyond a parish's target would come right back to the parish – and without deduction of the 6 percent cathedraticum, the archdiocesan assessment on all other parish revenue.
That feature not only made oversubscribing the CSA a benefit to parishes, but made the CSA an excellent vehicle for parish fund-raising campaigns, as it was the only way for them to earn 100-cent dollars instead of 94-cent dollars. Last year's goal of $15.6 million was oversubscribed by nearly $10 million.
But solving the archdiocese's financial deficit was not the only benefit that came from the CSA. There was also the way it encouraged a spirit of true stewardship among the faithful, in the view of Michael Murphy, archdiocesan director of development.
"It was because of Cardinal Szoka's leadership that an avenue was opened, giving every Catholic an opportunity to look beyond his or her immediate worshipping community to participate as responsible stewards of our larger communion of faith and be active disciples in what we profess to be the, 'one holy, Catholic and apostolic Church' at the same time we are providing our local Church with a stable revenue base," he said.
While the CSA was the keystone of Cardinal Szoka's solution to the archdiocese's financial difficulties, it was not his only contribution to better fiscal health, said Mercy Sr. Mary Korb, who was director of the archdiocesan Department of Finance and Administration during the Szoka years.
"He did balance the operating budget with the creation of the CSA, but he also did other things to enhance long-term financial stability. He is a very financially astute person, and if he identified a trend that would have a financial impact on the diocese, he addressed it," said Sr. Korb, who now runs the archdiocesan cemeteries.
Likewise, when Cardinal Szoka arrived at the Vatican in 1990 to become the new president of the Prefecture for the Economic Affairs of the Holy See, he faced the challenge of stemming a tide of red ink that had been flowing for two decades.
The cardinal called together the heads of all the national bishops' conferences from around the world in April 1991, and laid out the problem and his proposed solution. "I presented the financial situation, others presented the canonical aspects, and we simply presented the problem to the presidents of the conferences and asked them to go home and explain the situation to the bishops of their conferences, and ask them to respond in accord with the canon," he has recalled of the meeting.
"The answer to any kind of an operating deficit is very simple – either you reduce expenses or you increase income, or a combination of both. My objective was to try to do both," he added.
Bishops throughout the world were reminded that Canon 1271 of the 1983 Code of Canon Law requires them to supply the Holy Father with the means needed to fulfill his worldwide ministry.
That deficit was to reach its highest peak, $87 million in 1991, but was down to only about $2.5 million the next year, and 1993 saw the first surplus in 23 years. Surpluses continued during Cardinal Szoka's time in the position (he became "governor" of the Vatican City State in 1997), and through the year 2000, before the budget again went into deficit.
Principles of Church financial management learned in northern Michigan, and further tested in the Archdiocese of Detroit, had been successfully applied to the worldwide Catholic Church.
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