Looks like Pope Francis' American Catholics are a bigger bunch of cheapskates than even Rush Limbaugh imagines, which would better explain the Pope's recent anti-capitalist remarks than some new turn in the direction of Marxism:
Here Rush Limbaugh paints the figure broadly and still comes up with a pretty small sum:
Let me give you some numbers here. The citizens of the United States of America in 2012 donated a total of $316 billion to charity. Catholic Charities USA distributed $4.7 billion. $316 billion donated to charity by the American people. Catholic Charities USA distributed $4.7 billion. The point is -- that's not to denigrate the church -- that is to illustrate as the Reason.com writer said, the pope's big cause is charity. Without capitalism, there wouldn't be any. Without capitalism, the Catholic Church wouldn't have any money to donate to anybody. Without capitalism, there wouldn't be enough people with enough money to give it to the Catholic Church in the form of donations itself.
But The New York Times, here, claims $2.9 billion of $4.67 billion came from US taxpayers in 2010, and only 3% from churches (just $140 million!):
Catholic Charities is one of the nation’s most extensive social service networks, serving more than 10 million poor adults and children of many faiths across the country. It is made up of local affiliates that answer to local bishops and dioceses, but much of its revenue comes from the government. Catholic Charities affiliates received a total of nearly $2.9 billion a year from the government in 2010, about 62 percent of its annual revenue of $4.67 billion. Only 3 percent came from churches in the diocese (the rest came from in-kind contributions, investments, program fees and community donations).
