SW News: Pontifical charity Aid to the Church in Need (ACN) supported more than 40,000 priests with Holy Mass stipends and helped around 21,000 nuns in 2022. This was revealed by the organization in a report explaining the funds it received and the expenditure. As much as 148.7 million euros were collected last year for all projects and it includes 2.7 million euros fetched from previous years’ reserves.Together with 2.7 million Euros taken from reserves of previous years, activities amounting to 148.7 million Euros were financed in 2022.

Of this total amount of expenditure, 82.6%, or 122.8 million Euros, was dedicated to mission-related activities Apart from supporting the priestly formation of 14,000 seminarians, ACN also funded 972 construction projects, mostly in Africa and Latin America. Over a third of such projects comprised churches and chapels. In third-world nations, the pontifical aid organization also provided funds for the purchase of 1,253 vehicles for pastoral and humanitarian activities.Among the vehicles purchased include 564 cars, 252 motorcycles, 16 boats, 11 buses and four trucks apart from 400 bicycles. ACN said the purchase of these vehicles makes pastoral activities a lot easier for priests, nuns and catechists in African and Latin American nations.As per the report, as many as 5,702 projects were funded by the pontifical charity last year, which is 404 more than the previous year.

All these projects were undertaken in 1,199 dioceses spread across 128 nations. Out of these projects, the largest one was in Iraq where a partly destroyed parish center was restored at a cost of one million euros.The nation which received the largest chunk of funds from ACN last year was Ukraine. The aid organization enhanced its outreach activities as the local Church is going through a difficult phase because of the Russian onslaught. As many as 353 projects were financed in the Eastern European nation. A good part of the funds went to provide assistance to priests, religious and seminarians of both the Greek and Latin Rites. As much as 9.5 million euros were given to Ukraine and it was 10 percent of the organization’s total aid during the year.When it came to the regions, Africa received the maximum support from ACN and it stood at 31.5 percent followed by the Middle East and Central and Eastern European nations.