A 13.3 Million Tala Church and “a Deposit for a House”: Samoa Counts the Cost of Its Church Buildings

• A single church in Samoa can cost more than 10 million tala to build
• St Theresa of the Child Jesus in Lepea cost 13.3 million tala and still owed 1.26 million
• Samoa has about 400 churches for a population of around 230,000
• One mother gave 41,600 tala over four years, money she said could have been a house deposit

Building a single church in Samoa can cost more than 10 million tala (about $5.5 million), ABC News reported on April 19, 2024, in a report by Johnson Raela on the price Samoans pay to support their churches.

The St Theresa of the Child Jesus Catholic Church in Lepea cost 13.3 million tala ($7.3 million), and 1.26 million tala ($700,000) of that remained outstanding. Samoa has about 400 churches serving roughly 230,000 people, and 90 per cent attend regularly. The minimum wage is 3 tala an hour.

Parish chairman Salausa Dr John Ah Ching said the church needed “to bring people together as a community of faith”. A mother of 12, identified only as Lagi, said she sent 200 tala a week to her church in Samoa for four years, a total of 41,600 tala. “It is too much,” she said, adding that the money could have covered a deposit on a house. Reverend Aisoli Luli of the Samoan National Council of Churches said: “If they [congregation] don’t have money, then don’t give any money, simple as that.”

Samoan historian Saui’a Louise Mataia-Milo said faith and culture are bound together: “Every time we think about our spiritual lives, it is cultural as well.”

Jamaica’s churches also raise large sums from members for new sanctuaries, halls and repairs, and many members are also saving for land or a home. The Samoan experience is a useful check. A building project should be sized to what the congregation can sustain, debt should be planned and disclosed, and leaders should be honest that money given to a building is money a family cannot put towards its own house.

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