The cost of Pope Benedict XVI's visit to Spain next week is coming
under fire from lay groups -- and even some priests -- at a time when
people are suffering from painful budget cuts.
The pope arrives in
Madrid on August 18 to attend the final four days of the Roman Catholic
Church's six-day youth festivities, expected to draw more than one
million faithful.
Organisers of the World Youth Day celebrations
put the price tag of staging the event, without counting security costs,
at 50-60 million euros ($72-86 million).
This includes the cost
of building a 200-metre (656-foot) long stage at the Cuatro Vientos
aerodrome where the pope will deliver the final mass of his visit on
August 21 and decorating it with a giant metal tree.
It also pays
for setting up hundreds of water fountains and 20 giant screens at the
aerodrome, and installing showers at the public schools that will be
used to house pilgrims from outside Madrid.
Organisers say 80
percent of the cost of the event will be financed by payments from the
young pilgrims, with the rest coming from donations by companies and
individuals.
But critics argue that corporate sponsors are
eligible for tax rebates of up to 80 percent of the amount they donate
because the government declared World Youth Day celebrations to be an
event of "exceptional public interest".
The Priests Forum, which
groups together 120 priests from Madrid's poorest parishes, has
criticised this loss of state revenues, especially since the government
has slashed social spending and public worker salaries.
Evaristo
Villar, a 68-year-old priest who is one of the leaders of the group,
said the Church has had to ally itself with large multinationals to
cover the costs of the "showmanship" of the event.
"These
companies that are backing World Youth Day and the pope's visit leave
much to desire. They are the ones who, together with international
capital, have caused the crisis," he said.
"We are not against the pope's visit, we are against the way it is being staged."
Opponents
of the pope's visit have set up a Facebook page calling for a boycott
of the over 100 corporate sponsors of the event, including Coca-Cola,
telecoms giant Telefonica and Banco Santander.
Nearly 150 groups
that oppose the pope's visit plan to protest against the pontiff's visit
on August 17 on the eve of his arrival.
Spain's 15-M movement
against the management of the economic crisis, soaring unemployment and
political corruption -- named after its May 15 launch date -- is also
mulling a series of protests during his stay in Madrid.
"With the
economic crisis we are going through, we can't pay for this. The Church
should set the example," said a spokesman for the movement whose members
call themselves "the indignant".
The regional government of
Madrid in June slashed the education budget by 40 million euros this
year, nearly the amount that it will cost to hold World Youth Day, he
added.
Spain is struggling to emerge from nearly two years of
recession that has left it with a eurozone-high unemployment rate of
just over 20 percent and a bloated deficit.
Yago de la Cierva, the
executive director of World Youth Day 2011, said the budget for this
year's event will be 20 percent lower than for the last one in Sydney
three years ago even though four times as many pilgrims are expected to
come to the gathering in Spain.
"We have made huge effort of moderation, of economic responsibility," he said.
"The
new generations, young people today, they like big events and the
Church uses all the tools that exist to present the message of Jesus
Christ."
The World Youth Day celebrations were instituted by Pope
John Paul II in 1986 as a way to revitalize the faith among young
Catholics.
It was in Spain once before, in 1989 in the northwestern city
of Santiago de Compostela.