The “ecclesiastical crime” will jump to approximately $390 billion by 2050

In 2024, Christian leaders around the world will embezzle an estimated $86 billion from their followers.

That “ecclesiastical crime” will jump to approximately $390 billion by 2050, according to researchers Dr. Gina Zurlo, Dr. Todd Johnson, and Peter Crossing at the Center for the Study of Global Christianity, part of the Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary.

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The numbers are tucked away in a larger report about global Christianity published in the January issue of the International Bulletin of Mission Research.

The Christian ministry watchdog group Trinity Foundation summarized the problem this way:

Ecclesiastical crimes take on many forms such as skimming from an offering plate, restricted donation fraud (diverting mission donations to a personal expense account), and international cash smuggling.

Televangelists have transferred funds across international borders on private jets and failed to report these transactions resulting in “bulk cash smuggling.” 

We know these sorts of shenanigans occur because, frequently, Christian leaders are arrested for financial crimes. It’s incredibly hard, however, to pinpoint exactly how much crime occurs under the veil of Christianity. That can be blamed on everything from the fact that churches don’t have to file financial reports with the IRS, to the fact that they often blame crime on everything but religion, to the fact that they may not want to go public about being duped. In many ways, it’s like tracking sales in a black market; the very nature of how they operate—out of public sight—makes it hard to quantify.

Is there really any way to calculate financial crime in the Christian world?

Well, several years ago, that’s precisely what Zurlo and Johnson set out to do. In a separate paper, they explained the obstacles they were up against:

Nonprofit organizations—especially those that begin as small, under-resourced volunteer-run organizations—face even tougher challenges in combatting financial fraud. Because they often focus on their mission rather than strong administrative practices, a neglect of financial concerns can easily result. This neglect can be exacerbated when they enjoy tax-exempt status, as in the United States. Nonprofits also tend to be more trusting of their employees, assuming that they share the organization’s philanthropic goals… Charities that experience embezzlement—and many do—try to handle it quickly and quietly to avoid ruining their reputations, undermining their work, and thus receiving fewer donations. Consequently, most nonprofit fraud goes unreported.

So here’s what they did: They looked at data compiled by the Association of Certified Fraud Examiners (ACFE), which found that the U.S. economy “loses approximately 6 percent of its gross domestic product to fraud each year.” By using that metric and looking at what Christians stood to give in donations (to their churches, to other ministries, and to charity in general), they could estimate how much money might be stolen.

In 2015, they calculated, if Christians around the world gave $850.9 billion to charity and $773.5 billion to Christian causes specifically, that would suggest about $50 billion and $46 billion, respectively, “lost to fraud and embezzlement.”

In the newer 2024 paper, with updated numbers, the researchers say that Christians all over the world will give about $1.3 trillion to Christian causes… which would result in about $86 billion lost to ecclesiastical crime.

By 2050, they estimate, the $5.2 trillion given to Christian causes could lead to $390 billion lost to fraud.

It’s important to recognize that the researchers don’t treat Christians with any special deference here. Financial fraud exists everywhere and churches are no different. It’s a very secular way of looking at the problem. But they do suggest ways to combat the fraud, including routine financial audits, more transparency, better training, more oversight for any employee with access to church funds, getting insurance coverage for fraud, and taking action if there are suspicions of criminal activity.

In other words, churches won’t be able to stop fraud entirely, but they could minimize it by treating their finances the same way larger companies do.

A lot of fraud, the researchers explain, isn’t televangelists spending tithe money on private jets. Rather, it’s committed by people with no criminal record who make relatively little money but who have an intimate knowledge of the organization. They tend to escape scrutiny. And when you consider how many hundreds of thousands of smaller churches there are, all convincing members to hand over cash, many without proper oversight into how that money is being used, the potential for fraud is always imminent.

The question is whether church leaders are willing to do anything to prevent that kind of financial abuse.