Catholic Charities credit card unveiled.

Catholic Charities Credit Card Unveiled

With Caritas, the new affinity credit card for Catholic Charities USA, the non-profit organization hopes to generate $2.25 million in contributions in five years.

Every time a cardholder makes a purchase with the card, .5 percent of the sales price will be donated to Catholic Charities. The Caritas Mastercard is being marketed initially to 57,000 Catholic priests, nuns and Catholic personnel. A mailing dropped recently is receiving "slow, but good" response, according to Margaret Patterson, president of Magna Carda, affinity card marketing agency in Alexandria, Virginia.

Future mailings are scheduled to target the Catholic population in general. Although there are more than 53 million Roman Catholics in the United States, the mailings to the Catholic population will be done on a city-by-city basis, says Patterson. Catholic Charities is beginning with two test markets -- Indianapolis, Indiana, and the state of Wyoming, concentrating on a media mix of print, direct mail, radio and TV.

Initially, Catholic Charities hopes for 20,000 Caritas cardholders at the end of one year and 250,000 in five years. The five-year goal of $2.25 million is based on the calculation that each cardmember would spend $1,800 a year. The charitable contributions generated by the credit card purchases do not qualify for income tax deductions. "We are not encouraging debt," commented Reverend Thomas Harvey, Catholic Charities' executive director, but because the use of credit cards has "become a normal practice of everyday life, we think the card can serve human dignity."

Catholic Charities USA is a federation of 670 local Catholic agencies, providing services for about 7 million people. In 1987 it took in $1 billion, the majority of which -- 45.3 percent or $453 million came from government funds. With the introduction of the Caritas card, Catholic Charities hopes to boost the individual contributions portion of its income which accounted for 8.8 percent or $88 million.