History of Peter's Pence

During his public ministry, dedicated to proclaiming the Good News, Jesus accepted material assistance to support himself and the group of the twelve Apostles (Lk 8:1–3). This assistance was also used to help those most in need (Jn 12:4–7). From the very beginning, during St. Paul’s apostolic journeys, giving and sharing was one of the central themes of his preaching, as he urged collections in support of the Mother Church in Jerusalem (cf. Rom 15:25–28; 1 Cor 16:1–4).

This concrete participation in the needs of the community has taken various forms throughout history, giving rise to the awareness that all the baptized are called to support, according to their means, the work of evangelization and, at the same time, to come to the aid of the most needy throughout the world.

The Pence, as a donation to the Successor of Peter, developed in the 7th century with the conversion of the Anglo-Saxons. Having been evangelized by missionaries sent from Rome, they felt a strong bond of devotion tying them to the Holy Father, and began going on pilgrimages to Rome. There, the Schola Saxonum was established. This was a kind of pilgrim house which provided spiritual and material assistance to pilgrims. To support this institution, the Saxon rulers established a collection which, according to the earliest laws of the 11th century, was collected by households on the feast days of Peter and Paul and then delivered to the Pope, who divided it equally between the Holy See and the Schola. In the centuries that followed, as other European peoples converted to Christianity, it increasingly became a contribution of devotion, an expression of unity and shared responsibility within the Church.

In the modern era, with the end of the Papal States (1870), the unity of the Church was shattered. The same thing is true for the bond, which used to be represented by the Offering of the Christian Peoples to the Holy See, in several countries. The crisis that arose from these events marked a major break with the past, which also gave St. Peter’s offering an entirely new meaning that has been passed down to the present day. In Europe and overseas, a spontaneous movement of Catholics arose whose goal was to offer material aid to the Holy Father of their own accord. The warm response from Catholics was a great source of encouragement for the Pope. Thanks to this aid, he was able to allocate part of the offering to the care of those suffering the most (for example, following the devastating earthquake in Croatia in 1881), thus expressing a father’s concern for his children. He receives in order to give, and to give to those who need it most at that moment.