An official government analysis reveals that replacing the Church Fund with a 2 percent tax deduction would impose significantly higher costs on the state budget than maintaining the current system. <\/p>\n
The introduction of a 2 percent tax deduction for churches and religious associations would generate much higher costs for the state budget than maintaining the existing Church Fund, according to an official government analysis presented by Deputy Defense Minister Pawe\u0142 Bejda.<\/p>\n
In a response signed by Deputy Minister Bejda on July 15, the government stated that introducing a tax deduction of 2 percent of personal income tax for churches would “with high probability result in higher costs for the state budget than the expenditures currently incurred under the Church Fund.”<\/p>\n
Deputy Minister Bejda informed Sejm Marshal W\u0142odzimierz Czarzasty in a letter that a working group analyzed four target variants of solutions. “They have not yet received the approval of the Minister of Finance, who points to the need to take into account current state budget conditions,” he wrote.<\/p>\n
The 2026 budget guarantees expenditures for the Church Fund amounting to 272.56 million PLN. Currently, all legally operating religious associations in Poland benefit from it, including those that did not operate in the country in 1950 and lost no property. Ninety-five percent of the fund’s expenditures consist of social security contributions for clergy.<\/p>\n
Addressing potential budget impacts, Bejda noted that with PIT revenues in 2025 at approximately 200 billion PLN, if 50 percent of taxpayers decided to transfer a portion of their tax to religious associations, the reduction in state budget revenue would be about 2 billion PLN. Conversely, if 25 percent of taxpayers made such a decision, the amount would be about 1 billion PLN. He conveyed that an “exchange of positions with representatives of churches and other religious associations is underway, aimed at developing solutions that take into account both the public interest and the specifics of the functioning of individual religious communities.”<\/p>\n
The Press Office of the Polish Bishops’ Conference (KEP) informed the Polish Press Agency (PAP) that “so far, the Polish Bishops’ Conference has not received any specific proposal from the government regarding the liquidation or replacement of the Church Fund.”<\/p>\n
According to Dr. Hab. Maksymilian Stanulewicz from the Faculty of Law and Administration at Adam Mickiewicz University in Pozna\u0144, specializing in Polish constitutional history and religious law, “no one in Poland is ultimately keen to finally resolve the issue of the Church Fund.”<\/p>\n
Stanulewicz assessed that with 25 to 30 percent of eligible citizens making deductions to one of Poland’s religious associations, the state treasury would lose between 1 billion and 3 billion PLN. Consequently, such a solution is currently unprofitable for the state. He also pointed out that contrary to popular opinion, the 272.56 million PLN allocated to the Fund is not a heavy burden on state finances, representing one-tenth of the projected deduction amount.<\/p>\n
Furthermore, the expert noted that deduction-based solutions are unprofitable for smaller religious associations, many of which maintain historic buildings with a low percentage of believers compared to the interwar period. Meanwhile, the Catholic Church and the Polish Autocephalous Orthodox Church continue to receive funds through various alternative channels.<\/p>\n
The Church Fund was established under the Act of March 20, 1950, intended as a form of compensation for churches and religious associations for agricultural real estate confiscated by the state. Ninety-five percent of its current expenditures are social security contributions for clergy.<\/p>\n
In January 2024, Prime Minister Donald Tusk appointed an Interministerial Team for the Church Fund to develop concepts for changing its operation and the financing rules for clergy social and health insurance. On September 19, 2025, the Prime Minister appointed government representatives to the Governmental Concordat Commission to enable negotiations with the Church Concordat Commission.<\/p>\n
According to Supreme Audit Office (NIK) findings, the Ministry of Interior and Administration spent a total of 618,433,000 PLN from the Church Fund between 2021 and 2023. This included 585,265,000 PLN for clergy social and health insurance contributions, 31,728,000 PLN for conservation and renovation grants for historic sacral and church buildings, and 1,439,000 PLN for church charity and care activities. Report authors noted that fund expenditures increased from 193,664,000 PLN in 2021 to 224,646,000 PLN in 2023.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
An official government analysis reveals that replacing the Church Fund with a 2 percent tax deduction would impose significantly higher costs on the state budget than maintaining the current system. Ministry Warns of Higher Budget Costs The introduction of a 2 percent tax deduction for churches and religious associations would generate much higher costs for […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":20173,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"wpai_generated_summary":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[43],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-20172","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-politics-and-law"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bizonews.com\/pl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20172","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bizonews.com\/pl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bizonews.com\/pl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bizonews.com\/pl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bizonews.com\/pl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=20172"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/bizonews.com\/pl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20172\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bizonews.com\/pl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/20173"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bizonews.com\/pl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=20172"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bizonews.com\/pl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=20172"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bizonews.com\/pl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=20172"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}