When will state services for the churches end? – DW – 09.06.2023

Every year, large sums flow to the two major Christian churches in Germany. Last year they received more than half a billion euros from the state – from tax money from religious and non-religious people. Mind you, this is not about the church tax that the state collects for the churches and passes on to them.

To understand why more than 600 million euros went to the churches, you have to go back more than two centuries in history. During the Napoleonic occupation of Germany at the beginning of the nineteenth century, a far-reaching separation of church and state was decided.

During the liquidation of the “Holy Roman Empire of the German Nation” the churches were largely expropriated, monasteries and other church institutions were closed or became the property of the German states. This was laid down in 1803 in the so-called Reichsdeputationshauptschluss.

Because the churches had to hand over money and lands to the sovereigns, the latter undertook in return to pay the priests and pay other costs of the churches. To this day, the federal states, as the legal successors of the princes, pay this compensation.

Exit decided thing – for more than 100 years

It has actually been decided for a long time that these payments should end. As early as 1919, the Weimar Imperial Constitution stipulated that permanent payments should end with a one-time payment. Thirty years later, the Basic Law adopted this decision. Nevertheless, payments continue to be made every year and, above all, the payments are constantly increasing from a good 23 million euros in 1949 to over 602 million euros this year.

The federal states were actually quite satisfied with the situation, says the lawyer Hans Michael Heinig. You wouldn’t have had to pay a transfer fee as a result. “The churches were quite satisfied because they had insolvent debtors and these state payments flowed regularly.” Of course, this whole practice was not financially sustainable, “because we could have paid for the transfer a long time ago,” says church law expert Heinig, who teaches public law at the University of Göttingen.

However, the incumbent federal government would like to end the state benefits, which it also stipulated in the coalition agreement. At the beginning of the legislative period, a working group was set up in the Federal Ministry of the Interior, in which the federal government, the states and the churches discussed together. Before the end of this year, they want to have agreed on the key points for a basic regulation. The main issue is whether a one-time transfer fee is paid and how high it should be. And about how long the annual state benefits will continue to be paid.

Transfer fee – it’s about a lot of money

A lot of money is involved, as the draft law suggests, which was introduced to the Bundestag in 2020 by the then opposition parties FDP, Greens and Left Party. In this basic law for the replacement of state benefits, a one-time replacement payment of 18.6 times the current annual benefits was proposed, which would have corresponded to around 11 billion euros. The federal states should have paid this sum to the churches within 20 years. In addition, they would have had to continue paying the previous state benefits for 20 years.

The Münster constitutional lawyer Bodo Pieroth found too much. It is of the opinion that the compensation payments made to the churches over the centuries far exceeded the value of the formerly confiscated church property and quotes an expert report. According to this, assuming an annual interest rate of three percent, the churches would have received 194 times the value originally withdrawn over the last 100 years. At five percent interest, 603 times.

Heinig objects: “The churches were deprived of assets from which they could actually have made profits. The state benefits take the place of these profits.” Of course, the ongoing inflation must also be taken into account. “If I live in a house as a tenant for a long time and then want to buy the house, I don’t get the rental payment offset,” says Henig.

Can the church do without?

For the churches in Germany, state benefits make up only a small part of their income. In church taxes alone, the two churches together received almost 13 billion euros last year. In addition, they have income from property, but keep a low profile about how much comes together. As owners of forests, land, real estate and companies such as publishing houses, breweries, banks, insurance companies and holdings, they are large commercial enterprises.

“Both churches have an estimated turnover of 150 billion euros, if you add everything up,” says publicist Carsten Frerk, who has been dealing with this topic for years. However, the financial situation is very non-transparent, partly because the sales are spread over around 50,000 legal entities. According to estimates, the total assets of the two churches are worth 300 billion euros.

According to Frerk, church services such as day care centers, nursing homes or hospitals would not be in jeopardy if state services were to be abolished. “There is no connection between state services and Caritas, diaconia or other social tasks of the church. Only a maximum of two percent of these institutions are financed by the churches,” says Frerk. The state bears the main burden of the resulting costs. This is ensured by the principle of subsidiarity, according to which the state transfers tasks to civil society institutions.

Will the payments end now?

The misery from the outset was that the federal government did not have a hard implementation deadline by when this replacement had to take place, says canon law expert Heinig. The Federal Constitutional Court cannot step in and force the legislature to act. In addition, there is nothing to gain politically for the federal government. Either he annoys the churches or the countries.

Even now, only half of the German population is a member of one of the two churches. It is estimated that by 2060 they will lose half of their current members. In view of the lack of understanding among the population for the historical payments, which should have been ended 100 years ago, it is high time to find a solution, says Heinig. Especially since the Czech Republic, for example, has already done it and ended the state payments to the church by paying a transfer fee.