According to a Forsa poll recently 65% of Germans said they found the Catholic Church untrustworthy.
This trend has been linked to the 'bling bishop' scandal in which Catholic Bishop Franz-Peter Tebartz-van Elst was found to have spent millions of euros of church money on his own private house. He later 'resigned'. Once again ordinary Catholics had to endure the embarrassment of yet another Catholic cleric abusing the power and trust his position gave him.
In Germany, a tax is levied on church members by the
