The amount spent on aid and welfare by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints rose again in 2025, according to a new report issued Tuesday.
The church spent $1.58 billion last year on humanitarian, food donations and other welfare and self-reliance operations, according to “Caring for Those in Need: 2025 Report of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.”
That’s an increase of $130 million over what the church gave in 2024, or about 9%.
The contributions helped the church provide over 37 million pounds of food to people in 2025 through its network of 121 storehouses.
The funds come from donations made by church members and others, who believe they are following Jesus Christ’s two great commandments, to love God and their neighbors.
“We are guided by his example,” the church’s First Presidency said in the report. “... We seek to follow him by ministering to the sick, feeding the hungry and comforting the afflicted. Ours is a ministry of great joy to all of God’s children. ...
“Every meal shared, every shelter built, every kindness offered becomes part of the Lord’s work.”
The church’s charitable giving has risen annually since 2015, according to past reports and leader statements to the Deseret News.
| Year | Charitable expenditures |
|---|---|
| 2022 | $1.02 billion |
| 2023 | $1.36 billion |
| 2024 | $1.45 billion |
| 2025 | $1.58 billion |
The report also said that time donated by church member volunteers increased to 7.4 million hours in 2025, up 12% from 6.6 million hours a year ago.
The First Presidency characterized the efforts of church members as “remarkable.”
“I like to think of those individuals that are contributing their time and their talents and their means, their money to help,” said Blaine Maxfield, managing director of Welfare and Self-Reliance Services. “Many times, these contributions come in very small increments, and so it’s making a huge difference.”
Maxfield said the volunteer hours are a fraction of what church members actually provide. They largely include the hours people donate to help after disasters and other emergency response situations.
Other hours counted come from community service projects and volunteerism at the church’s welfare and self-reliance facilities, time donated by teachers who run self-reliance courses, the efforts of full-time humanitarian couple missionaries and work done by young service missionaries at church facilities.
They don’t include the hours of service regular full-time missionaries do weekly or the daily ministering that church members give each other and others around the world.
The church annually runs or participates with other charitable organizations in humanitarian aid projects around the world. The global breadth of them expanded to a record 196 countries or territories last year.
| Year | Projects | Countries |
|---|---|---|
| 2018 | 2,885 | 141 |
| 2019 | 3,221 | 142 |
| 2020 | 3,600 | 160 |
| 2021 | 3,909 | 188 |
| 2022 | 3,692 | 190 |
| 2023 | 4,119 | 191 |
| 2024 | 3,836 | 192 |
| 2025 | 3,514 | 196 |
The number of projects decreased for strategic reasons for a second year in a row, Maxfield said.
“That’s not a bad thing,” he said, “because what we’re focused on are projects that make the most impact.”
For example, the church provided vitamins to more than 21 million women and children, far exceeding its goal of 12 million.
“We have particularly focused on women and children with nutrition, vitamins, immunizations, education and literacy,” Maxfield said.
For example, maternal and neonatal tetanus (MNT) elimination drives helped nearly 80% of the Pakistani population become safe from MNT.
The report noted that the church now has 8,267,105 members in the Relief Society, its women’s organization. General Relief Society President Camille N. Johnson wrote last year that, “When you bless a woman, you bless a family, a community, a nation.”
President Johnson and Maxfield sit on the church’s Welfare and Self-Reliances Executive Committee with the Presiding Bishopric and a member of the Presidency of the Seventy.
“We look at needs and responsible solutions,” Maxfield said, “all through a lens of self-reliance.”
Last year, 140,000 people participated in the church’s self-reliance courses.
Maxfield said the landscape for global aid is dynamic and increasingly challenging. To meet the needs, the Church of Jesus Christ collaborates internationally with UNICEF, Helen Keller International, Vitamin Angels, CARE and others.
For example, the church supplied prenatal care to 219,000 pregnant women through new initiatives from UNICEF and CARE.
Donations of time included children in 2025, when the church’s Primary General Presidency invited the children’s organization in each of the faith’s more than 30,000 congregations to organize an annual service activity.
The report is packed with additional numbers. For example:
- Deseret Industries recycled 82,927,370 pounds of materials in 2025.
- The church facilitated 569 emergency relief projects, from supporting people after the wildfires in Los Angeles and after earthquakes in Myanmar.
“We certainly see the landscape changing across the world,” Maxfield said, “but what doesn’t change is the overall need that exists. We believe there’s an unprecedented need around the world to care for those that are in need.”
To learn more, read the full 48-page report here or visit Caring.ChurchofJesusChrist.org or the Instagram page.
Full First Presidency statement
The full statement provided in the report by the First Presidency stated:
“When Jesus Christ was on the earth, He taught two great commandments: to love God and to ‘love thy neighbour as thyself’ (Matthew 22:39). We are guided by his example. As The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, we seek to follow him by ministering to the sick, feeding the hungry, and comforting the afflicted. Ours is a ministry of great joy to all of God’s children.
“The Caring for Those in Need 2025 Report offers a glimpse into the remarkable efforts occurring throughout the world by our members. These acts of service are strengthened by the contributions of time and means from friends of other faiths and trusted organizations who unite with us in this blessed work. Inspired by the example of Jesus Christ, together we are helping to lift burdens, bring healing and restore hope to families and individuals in diverse circumstances.
“As we serve others, we are truly serving him (see Matthew 25:40). In this way, each of us is answering his call to be a light to the world and to follow the Savior’s pattern of loving our neighbor.
“We testify that Jesus Christ is at the center of this great work. May God bless you abundantly for your goodness, and may you feel His love as you continue to love and care for his children.”