Renovabis
| Renovabis | |
|---|---|
|
|
| legal form | Registered association |
| founding | March 3, 1993 |
| Seat | Freising |
| main emphasis | Pastoral, social and societal renewal of the former communist countries |
| Action space | Central, Eastern and Southeastern Europe |
| Chair | Heiner Koch |
| sales | 35,451,790.92 € (2019) |
| Employees | 57 (2020) |
| Website | www.renovabis.de |
Renovabis is a registered association of the Roman Catholic Church in Germany to strengthen churches and societies in Central, Eastern and Southeastern Europe. Renovabis supports pastoral, social and societal projects in the former socialist countries. The seat of Renovabis is the former prince-bishop's residence in Freising . The name refers to Psalm 104, 30: renovabis faciem terrae “You will renew the face of the earth”.
General
Since 1993, the association has helped people in 29 countries in Central, Eastern and Southeastern Europe to implement around 24,250 projects with a total volume of over 767 million euros (as of March 2019). The funds flow into church-pastoral, social-charitable and educational and media projects. The focus is on the principle of helping people to help themselves.
In concrete terms, Renovabis funds are used to build churches and community centers and equip family, women and youth centers, to maintain homes for orphans and street children and to train priests, religious and laypeople active in pastoral care. Funds are also used for church school programs and teacher training, for study grants and for the promotion of young journalists.
Emergence
Renovabis was launched on March 3, 1993 by the German Bishops' Conference (DBK) as a "solidarity campaign by German Catholics with people in Central and Eastern Europe" . The Central Committee of German Catholics (ZdK) suggested founding Renovabis . According to the founding texts, the action should be “a response by German Catholics to the social and religious new beginning in the states of the former Eastern Bloc after the collapse of the communist systems”. Renovabis presented itself to the German public for the first time on May 2, 1993.
Areas of activity
The association's work is based on two pillars: project work and the promotion of international church east-west partnership initiatives. The most important criterion in project work is “helping people to help themselves”. It is a condition that the project executing agency and the population work adequately on the project through material or personal contributions. A project can only receive funding if it remains viable without further help after the grant. Personal responsibility and qualifications of the executing agency are therefore indispensable prerequisites for the commitment of Renovabis.
Reports on the use of funds are required to monitor the progress of funded measures. Where necessary, Renovabis informs itself on site about the development and implementation of a project and consults experts and its own consultants. For all of these tasks, the promotion of projects does not result in new dependencies, but rather the “help for self-help” approach should be consistently maintained.
The other important area of activity of Renovabis is the promotion of exchange, dialogue and partnership between East and West. To this end, partnerships between parishes and other universal church east-west partnership initiatives are encouraged and supported. Annually organized meetings and congresses, in which Eastern European groups from all over Germany as well as guests from Central and Eastern European partner countries take part, serve to exchange experiences and provide information.
Renovabis has set up a foundation whose task it is to support the work of the solidarity campaign on a permanent and sustainable basis.
financing
The income in 2019 was a good 34.5 million euros. They come primarily from church budget funds, public or corporate funds, donations and collections. Renovabis carries the DZI - donation seal . The annual budget of Renovabis for projects in 2019 was 28.9 million euros, the number of funded projects was 653 in 2019. The Renovabis budget is made up of church tax funds from the Pentecost collection - intended for the concerns of Renovabis Donations, bequests and inheritances as well as from public funds.
On October 1, 2016, Christian Hartl was appointed as the new General Manager by the German Bishops' Conference . His predecessor was the Jesuit Father Stefan Dartmann ( General Manager from November 1, 2010 to May 31, 2015).
Partnerships
The Renovabis solidarity campaign initiates and accompanies hundreds of partnerships between West and East and thus promotes the exchange of experiences, human encounters and mutual learning. Renovabis is in contact with around 1,500 partnership groups. With their mostly voluntary commitment, these groups build living bridges of understanding with the people in Central, Eastern and Southeastern Europe, who live in diverse traditions and have a rich spiritual heritage.