Hypothetical entrance fee in churches, the prefect of the Worship Buildings Fund: it would serve for preservation

Churches managed by the Fondo Edifici di Culto, an employee of the Ministry of the Interior, could soon be subject to ticketing: a special ticket could thus be created to visit them. Raising the hypothesis is the FEC prefect, Angelo Carbone, who told the AgCult agency that he agrees with such a measure: “it’s a problem that clashes with the fact that if the church is a place of worship, you can’t ask for an entrance ticket. But otherwise we don’t have the possibility to preserve these churches in an optimal way.”

The issue has been talked about for some time. On the topic of resources for churches dependent on the Ministry of the Interior, former minister Matteo Salvini had also intervened a year ago, declaring that the FEC has only 6 million euros for ordinary and extraordinary maintenance operations: for Carbone, at least 70 million would be needed. All projects have remained on paper for now: in 2018, the possibility of introducing a €2 ticket had emerged, which was then not implemented. Now, however, the hypothesis is back on the table, because the more time passes, the more critical the situation in houses of worship becomes: consider that the FEC manages churches visited by thousands and thousands of visitors (from Santa Croce to Santa Maria Novella in Florence, from Santa Maria del Popolo to Santa Maria della Vittoria in Rome and many others, with extraordinary masterpieces by artists such as Giotto, Michelangelo, Bernini, and Caravaggio), and more visits equals greater maintenance needs.

In all, there are over eight hundred churches managed by the FEC, which can rely, as it turns out, on meager resources. And it could therefore remedy this by forcing visitors eager to see Bernini’s St. Teresa or the Cerasi Chapel with Caravaggio’s works to pay an entrance fee.

Image: the Cerasi Chapel. Ph. Credit Frederick Fenivessy

Hypothetical entrance fee in churches, the prefect of the Worship Buildings Fund: it would serve for preservation

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