A new report has been published examining how faith-based businesses and financial institutions actually put their beliefs into practice.
The new “Multi-Faith Economy Index” was developed by Consulus, which bills itself as a “global creative change firm” that works towards “an Economy of Communion”.
The index, launched at Lambeth Palace, examines how faith-based businesses and foundations put their faith into practice in their daily practices and business decisions.
Businesses were asked 10 questions about issues like faith identity, capital and investment, governance, people and society, and impact. Each answer was given a grade of between 0 and 2, meaning the maximum score on the index is 20.
The pilot index looked at 100 organisations and granted any that scored 18 or above the title of “thought leader” in the sector.
The banking category was dominated by Islamic institutions, with all but one of the 14 “thought leaders” in the sector being Islamic. Cologne-based Pax Bank was the lone Christian bank granted thought leader status.
The realm of asset management was more equally split, with three Islamic thought leaders in the sector and two Christian thought leaders, namely CCLA Investment Management, which was founded in 1958 to manage the Church of England’s investments and US-based Thrivent Asset Management, which was founded by Lutherans.
Among foundations, Christians were more dominant. Two of the four thought leaders in the sector are explicitly Christian - Catholic Relief Services and Caritas Internationalis. One was Islamic and one was founded by a Christian but is devoted to religious understanding in general - the John Templeton Foundation.
The index noted that faith-based institutions had developed from merely avoiding “sin” industries and moved increasingly towards investing in social good.
Consulus stressed its report was just a pilot and that scores were based on the published output of organisations, not on their actual actions – meaning that many institutions may actually deserve a higher ranking, but do not have one because they have not publicised their efforts.
The group said that it would develop its framework and use a larger sample of organisations for future editions.
