Overview
- The five-day Landessynode opened Friday in Bonn to consider a draft finance strategy responding to sustained revenue decline.
- The package targets structural savings of at least €33 million by 2030, equal to about 20% of today’s church-tax intake.
- Proposals include reducing funds for the Diakonie, development aid and a hardship or unemployment fund, selling student dormitories and increasing parental contributions at evangelical schools.
- Präses Thorsten Latzel called the measures painful but necessary as membership stands near 2.1 million with roughly 70,000 departures each year.
- Further steps under discussion include cutting about half of the 1,400 parish posts by 2040 and replacing some hardship funding with church collections, while several groups have announced protests.