Vatican: richest city?

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catholic1seeks

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I just found out that Vatican City “is the richest city on Earth”.

Why? How can this be?
Is the Church’s money in good use???
 
The Vatican’s yearly income is on the order of $500 million per year–on the status of a medium to medium-large American University–and generally the Vatican operates at a slight loss on per year funds, having to make up the deficit by donations from local dioceses (“Peter’s pence”)

The Vatican does possess unique, priceless, and irreplacable artwork, literary works, and archaelogical finds–and CANNOT sell these items or even take loans on them-the Church acts as a conservator for the ages, and the conservation adds to the Vaticans expenses.
 
Lion_of_Narnia said:
The Vatican does possess unique, priceless, and irreplacable artwork, literary works, and archaelogical finds–and CANNOT sell these items or even take loans on them-the Church acts as a conservator for the ages, and the conservation adds to the Vaticans expenses.
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To clarify, these works of art belong to the world. They are merely in the Church’s keeping. If they were sold, they would become scattered and destroyed – what a loss that would be for the entire human race.
 
I think one has to take the demographic in mind here also, the size, ect. The link provided has nothing to do with the vatican by the way.:rolleyes:
 
Caesar517 said:
To clarify, these works of art belong to the world. They are merely in the Church’s keeping. If they were sold, they would become scattered and destroyed – what a loss that would be for the entire human race.
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It is considered sacred art (most of it) and its not just a loss of art if that happened- its a loss of sacred art, a different category of horror for a christian.
 
notsmart said:
I think one has to take the demographic in mind here also, the size, ect. The link provided has nothing to do with the vatican by the way.:rolleyes:
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exactly, i posted that because i googled “richest city on earth”, vatican city wasnt mentioned on the first search page.
 
Plus, you take the value of everything and divide it by approximately 1000 “citizens” and on a secular level, the value would be quite high. No housing projects, no slums, etc.
 
I am American and I have been to the Vatican on a pilgrimage. It contains a lot of greek and roman classical art, not just sacred art. It is one of the largest collections of classical art in the world.
 
It’s nowhere close to the “richest city”. I think whoever made that claim divided out the estimated wealth (or the annual budget) of the Vatican by the 824 citizens (2008est. in the CIA factbook) of Vatican city to get a really large “per capita” number.

Only eight hundred twenty four citizens (estimated of course)… are mostly clergy, bishops, the pope, and the swiss guard. It says that 3,000 or so lay workers live outside the Vatican and are not citizens.

Is the money in good use? I guess that depends on whether you believe maintaining/running the Vatican is a good use. I would say yes.
 
Lion_of_Narnia said:
The Vatican’s yearly income is on the order of $500 million per year–on the status of a medium to medium-large American University–and generally the Vatican operates at a slight loss on per year funds, having to make up the deficit by donations from local dioceses (“Peter’s pence”)
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Let’s see…that averages out to about 50 cents per Catholic. How scandalous!
 
**Thanks for the answers.

My source, which shouldn’t be reliable, was a television review on the new anti-Catholic movie* Angels and Demons*.**
 
jfoges said:
I am American and I have been to the Vatican on a pilgrimage. It contains a lot of greek and roman classical art, not just sacred art. It is one of the largest collections of classical art in the world.
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And don’t forget that LIBRARY with the largest collection of ancient manuscripts on earth. Not to mention incunabula.
 
and don’t priests make like 20 something thousand a year? i think it’s officially at the poverty level for 2 person families lol.
 
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