VATICAN CITY – The U.S.-based Papal Foundation presented Pope Benedict XVI with a check for more than $7.5 million.
The foundation designated more than $6.8 million for 105 grants supporting charitable projects and almost $700,000 for scholarships for priests, religious and laypeople studying at one of the pontifical universities or institutes in Rome.
The pope held a special audience April 4 with 150 members of the Philadelphia-based foundation, including Cardinal Anthony J. Bevilacqua, retired archbishop of Philadelphia and chairman of the foundation, and Cardinal Theodore E. McCarrick, retired archbishop of Washington and the foundation’s president.
The pope thanked them for their generous support and prayed that their “good works continue to multiply” and “provide for the material and spiritual needs of the whole human family.”
The Papal Foundation was established in 1990 and has given more than $41 million in grants for the building of churches, seminaries, schools, hospitals and other projects for the care of the poor around the world.