Offices and Services - International Economic Solidarity

The Service of Economic Solidarity was formed in March 1999 under the the Statutes of International Solidarity, approved by the General Definitory and later confirmed by the General Chapter of 2000.

The Office aims to implement the vision of economic solidarity as elaborated and proposed by the VI Plenary Council of the Order (Prop. 21-28).

The essential function of this Office is to organize and distribute the resources collected from the different jurisdictions of the Order and their benefactors. The Promotor of Solidarity (Br. Helmut Rakowski, prov. of Rhine-Westphalia) contacts the provinces regularly in order to gather these resources.

The amount collected is channelled into two Funds, each with a clearly denoted purpose:

The “Boni Pastoris Mater” Fund: In accordance with donors’ intentions, it is used for the missionary activities of the Order. Money from this Fund is used for the following fraternal, apostolic and charitable purposes exclusively in Asia, Africa and Latin America:
a) Implanting the Franciscan-Capuchin charism
b) Helping the Order of the Capuchin Poor Clares
c) Apostolic and missionary works of Capuchin Franciscans
d) Social projects for helping the poor
e) Assistance to the brothers and sisters of the Franciscan family and to develop the Franciscan charism in the Church and in society.
The “S. Felice da Cantalice” Fund: Its purpose is to respond to the needs of fraternal solidarity of the entire Order. Money from this Fund is used for the following fraternal purposes:
a) Necessities of fraternities and jurisdictions
b) Care of the aged and sick brothers
c) Needs of initial and ongoing formation in the jurisdictions
d) Assisting the Order of the Capuchin Poor Clares
e) Works of Capuchin-Franciscan evangelization when there is no proper support from the Church or local benefactors (Statutes of International Economic Solidarity, $ 4,1 and 5,1).

The Office receives requests for financial assistance, which are duly formulated according to a prescribed procedure (see annexes), between the 1st of January and the 31st of July every year In order that requests can be properly considered, the documentation should be complete, clear and precise. The request should be always accompanied by the recommendation of a Minister provincial of the Order or their respective vice-provincial or the superior of the respective custody or delegation.

It is difficult to deal with requests arriving after the specified deadline. These would normally be postponed to the following year.

The requests received by the Office are examined by the project managers (at the moment Br. Stefanos Tedla, prov. of Eritrea; Br. Jean-Guy Lanthier, prov. of Eastern Canada; and Br. Carlos Antonio Tavares, prov. of Minas Gerais, Brazil). This to see whether the request conforms with our priorities and to assess the technical integrity of the project, the realism of the level of financing and the feasibility of the proposals.

The recommendations of the project managers are passed to the international commission for economic solidarity. This commission is composed of 10 to 12 members, chosen from all the Conferences of the Order (at present they are Br. Vincente Carlos Kiaziku, def. Gen., president; Br. Manoel Delson Pedreira da Cruz, def. Gen., vice-president; Br. Frank Fugini, NACC; Br. Huub Boelaars, CENOC;Br. David Francis Peramangalam, CCSMI; Br. Hubert Calas, CENOC; Br. Francisco García, CCA; Br. José Bernardo Magalhaes, CCB; Br. Angelo Pagano, CONCAO; Br. José Luis Aparicio, CIC; Br. Kazimierz Synowczyk, CECOC; Br. Othmar Noggler, CENOC; and Br. Gianfranco Palmisani, CIMPCap). The commission meets once a year, generally in October. It studies all the requests presented to the Office, receives the observations of the project managers, and then makes its own recommendations which the Office later forwards to the General Definitory.
It is the General Definitory that takes decisions in relation to all the requests for financing, and then communicates its decisions to the economic solidarity which prepares the approved amount to be disbursed.

The disbursements of substantial amounts to different projects are normally done between January and June. However this period can be extended to the second half of the year or to the nearest opportunity, depending on the availability of resources. The disbursement of the amount also depends on the nature of the projects, their relative urgency and the local situation.

The Office of economic solidarity informs all the ministers of the Order regarding the projects received and the decision taken on them by the General Definitory.

Information is also sent to the Promoter of Solidarity about any sums paid directly from one jurisdiction to another within the framework of economic solidarity. A simple form can be used for this purpose (see documents).