If last year the initiative was a bus trip by bus in which they embarked on a dozen declarants who had not marked the X of the Catholic Church, this year the Episcopal Conference will organize “more than 60 proximity routes to teach the impact of the ‘X’ of the Church in the lives of millions of people.” This is the 2025 Xtantos campaign, with which the Secretariat for the maintenance of the Church to encourage the X in the box of the rent in favor of the Church and, with the routes, it is intended to “show the social and spiritual work of the Church at the local level.”
The initiative has been presented this Friday at the headquarters of the Episcopal Conference, in Madrid, by the bishop responsible for this secretariat, Vicente Rebollo, and its director, José María Albalad. The latter has stood out as “after last year’s initiative, in which people criticism of the Church changed their vision after a five -day trip to the heart of their activity,” these routes propose in 60 of the 69 Spanish territorial dioceses. With this proposal, called ‘Line 105 Xtantos’ (in reference to the number of the church box in the Declaration of Income), the bishops intend to “reinforce the commitment of an open -door church that goes out to meet all people, especially those who are far or most need.”
The objective of the campaign is to underline that “mark box 105 is a simple way to collaborate with the maintenance of the Church, which has no cost for the taxpayer.” Albalad recalled the “fiscal democracy exercise” that involves being able to mark these boxes in each income campaign, because “in fact, it is one of the few things we can decide on our taxes: if we leave it blank, it is the state that decides where to allocate that 0.7% of our taxes.” They have also recalled that it is possible to simultaneously mark the boxes of the Catholic Church and that of social purposes, without paying more or return less.
Any taxpayer can “get on the 105 xtantos line” through a registration form that will be available on the Linea105xtantos.es website from April 10. To do this, you have to select your diocese, which will later be the one that directly contacts the participants, a maximum of 15 people per route, to communicate the day, the time and the meeting point for the visit, which will be between the months of April and June. It will also be every diocese that designs the format, by bus or foot, and the days of the route. All routes will have in common to show how Christian parishes and communities live at the service of others.
The Church has some concern with the annual results of the income campaign of each year. In absolute numbers, there has been significant growth. In 2024, 7,839,984 statements were reached that marked the ecclesial box, 208,841 more than in the previous year, which meant increasing income by 6.18% until reaching the record of 382,437,998 euros. However, percentage, only 30.43% of the declarants chose to mark this box in 2024, 0.56% less than the previous year and well below the results of a decade ago, which were above 40%.
“Occupied more than concerned,” Albalad defined the attitude of the Church in the face of this problem, to questions from this newspaper. “With these campaigns we try to make visible the work of the Church and, above all, the concrete casuistry of a tax that is a great stranger for many taxpayers,” he added.
He also explained that, by default, the statements of the new taxpayers are blank in both boxes. «In fact, the box of social ends falls proportionally in a way greater than that of the Church. This is not a discharge, “he explained, to add that with the campaign” we want not only to continue supporting us, but to reach the new taxpayers who join the system. ” “Reversing that fall in the percentage will be very complex, it is a long -term path,” he recognized.
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