10

This Wikipedia list puts the Greek Orthodox church's net worth at 700B Euros in 2011 (about 974B USD), above any branch of the Catholic church or other religion. Its source is France 24, but I am not sure whether the 700B estimate is trustworthy. Other miscellaneous sources differ; e.g. Orthodox Church Quotes quotes the net worth at simply over 1B.

Is Wikipedia's claim true? The claim has two parts:

  • Is the net worth of the Greek Orthodox church around 700B Euros?
  • Is the Greek Orthodox church the single wealthiest religious organization in the world?
Improve this question
5
  • 11
    For most large old denominations their "wealth" is tied up in large single-use historic buildings. The "value" of their historic cathedrals may technically be huge, but it's not like they can sell them and liquidate the assets.
    – DJClayworth
    Commented Feb 27, 2023 at 19:40
  • 6
    The exact definition of "net worth" is really quite complicated even for semi-liquid assets. Jeff Bezos owns about $90B worth of Amazon stock. However, if we would try to turn this into cash tomorrow, the stock would collapse and the yield would be not anywhere near $90B . So what is the stock really worth?
    – Hilmar
    Commented Feb 28, 2023 at 1:26
  • 3
    @DJClayworth I don't know very much about Greece, but I live in a country dominated by a christian church and I know that their properties are not just the churches. Online searches give no results, but I am not surprised, anyway at least they own the residential buildings for the clerics, they own the monasteries which in Greece are a tourist attraction, probably they manage hospitals and similar institutions (here those owned by the church are profitable as private clinics), then there are the properties left as inheritance by people who die without children. These are just some examples.
    – FluidCode
    Commented Feb 28, 2023 at 9:42
  • 1
    @mustermax One example of other properties: The Swedish church owns 2% of Sweden's forests, which makes up about 70% of the country.
    – pipe
    Commented Feb 28, 2023 at 15:16
  • I note the Wikipedia article no longer contains the claim, so arguably this is not notable, but Caleb's answer explains why.
    – Oddthinking ♦
    Commented Jun 16 at 21:49

1 Answer 1

Reset to default
2

There was an update to the Wikipedia article on May 8, 2023 by User:Virtuus. Sharing the text of the edit (emphasis mine)

the France24 article about the Greek church has a typo. According to this Guardian article: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2011/oct/04/greece-orthodox-church-economic-crisis, the [sic] "the church was worth €700m in 2008", not "€700 billion"

The Guardian article in question, "Orthodox church appears to be exempt from austerity measures" (Alain Salles, 4 Oct 2011) quotes the net worth at €700m, or possibly up to €1bn, and provides additional context:

According to the right-of-centre daily Kathimerini newspaper, the church was worth €700m in 2008. Manos, a former finance minister, reckons the figure is at least €1bn. The €2.5m in tax paid is slight in comparison to these unconfirmed figures. But this is only part of what the church owns, in the care of the central administration. It does not take into account the many parishes, some of which are very rich, nor property under the direct ownership of Greece's 80 bishoprics, which enjoy considerable independence. It also overlooks the wealth of 450 monasteries, some of which are affiliated to the church, others not (those on Mount Athos, for example, have a separate status). The Orthodox Patriarchs of Constantinople, Jerusalem and Alexandria all own property in Greece. "Greece is staring at a pile of money and everyone is behaving as if it was invisible," says author Vassilis Alexakis, who has written a caustic novel about Mount Athos in French.

While this does not directly answer the question of what the church is worth today, based on this inflation calculator, €1bn is worth about €1.4bn in 2024, over two orders of magnitude less than the €700bn quoted. The France24 article (27 June 2011) does not appear to provide a source for its claim.

Based on the evidence from the Guardian article, we can rate the claims as follows:

Is the net worth of the Greek Orthodox church around 700B Euros?

No, not in 2008 Euros and likely not today. And,

Is the Greek Orthodox church the single wealthiest religious organization in the world?

No, as 1.4B Euro is less than other organizations listed including for example the Church of England (quoted at 12B USD = 11 Euro), the Catholic Church in Germany (quoted at 26B USD = 24B Euro), and the Mormon (LDS) Church in the United States (quoted at 236B USD = 220B Euro).

Improve this answer

You must log in to answer this question.

Not the answer you're looking for? Browse other questions tagged .