Impoverished Clergy
The underpayment of the clergy has long been a problem of deep concern to the Church of England. A report prepared by a Co mission of the Church Assembly shows that more than 5,000 ou of 12,000 incumbents have less than £400 a year, and that so hundreds have less than £300. In the days of the diminishin: purchasing-power of the pound such incomes are utterly insuffi cient to enable a parson to maintain his house and feed and educat his family ; his spiritual work is under the handicap of constan pecuniary anxiety. The Commission was faced by the fact tha there is a great disparity in incomes, some of the livings whic carry greater responsibilities having the smaller emoluments. Wi a view to diminishing extreme poverty it is recommended that suitable districts parishes should be united, and that the surplus incomes from the better-paid livings should be pooled and di tributed among the poorest. Even so the pool made available wou be small, and the minimum income aimed at under the schem' is only £400 a year, with a house free—which, with taxation an the cost of living anything like as high as they are today, is wholl inadequate for the proper support of a rector or vicar with a wif and family. The obvious fact is that fresh sources of money ou211 to be made available. The Free Churches without any endowmen support their ministers out of the voluntary contributions of the congregations. Are Anglican congregations unequal to a simile effort?
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