Every local Catholic donation drive guarantees that 97%+ goes directly to the poor. The money for church maintenance is usually in a separate collection. It would also be possible to argue that all Catholic activity in non-Western nations goes "to the poor," including missions. The Catholic Church is, however, the largest charitable organization in the world by far. I've been searching for a direct source but haven't had any luck. In any case, most orders of Catholic priests take a vow of poverty and overhead costs are kept to a minimum. Scratch that, found Catholic Charities breakdown. Guess I lied. 89% of expenses were spent on Program Costs. Which was close enough to 90% for my tastes, it might have been a bad year.