CLERGY STIPENDS.

Press, Volume LV, Issue 9991, 22 March 1898, Page 6

CLERGY STIPENDS.

TO THK EDITOR OF THE PRESS. Sir, —The time has once more come round when the chucchwardens and members of the different vestries have to collect their promised subscriptions towards their vicars' stipend*. I have devoted a few hours during the last three wesks in my district trying to collect the sums allotted to mc, but I am sorry to say that I find a tendency shown by a lew parishioners to ignore the requests made by mc, for what reasons 1 fail to perceive. In our parish we have one of the best vicars, a man of sound learning, and who devotes the greater part of his time to the poor, and a good amount of his small stipend is devoted to their requirements, but still we have a difficulty iv raising the required sum. Men who know anything of incomes will know that to live on £250 a year is not an easy task for any professional man, especially when he is expected to be open-handed towards the poor, and to mix on terms of general equality with the rich. It is almost grotesque, if it were not so sad, to remember that with all his efforts our Bishop seems unable to obtain the comparatively small sum required from the laity. Why is it, indeed, that the laity of the Church of England show themselves more ' Back ward than the laity of any other communion in making provision for their clergy? It can hardly be that they dispute the obligation which lies upon Christian laymen to free their clergy a? far as possible from worldly cares. Only a very few would take up such a position, and we must look further afield if we wish to explain the comparative but undoubted indifference of laymen, in the matter. Our Bishop some two years back hit the true nail on the head when he remarked that churchpeople do not contribute to the support of the clecgy In proportion to their means, because they had an idea that the churches were well supported from the Church property. What id habitually forgotten by our laity is—First, that the number of clergy has very largely increased during recent years, whilst at the same time many new spheres of work have opened out for which no provision is made by the old endowments ; and second, that even the old endowments themselves are now very greatly reduced in value, especially in the agricultural districts. Most people are probably ignorant of the fact, yet it is a fact, that no greater danger at present threatens the old Church of England than the falling, almost vanishing incomes of her clergy. If the inception of the Clergy Sustentation Fund does no other good, it will at least do this good—that it will enlighten the laity as. to the duty of giving much more money to the cause of church work than they have been wont to do. The fact is that the whole matter of payment of the clergy is a laymen's question, and the sooner they can be brought to see it in this light the better. No doubt there are some foolish persons who think it well for a clergyman to live like an artisan on a hundred a year, and conform himself to what they call the Apostolic example. But we have to take things as they are, and it is quite certain that a clergy composed of men of this class would be a clergy unlearned, unable to deal with complex questions, and utterly without influence. I say little ot the fact that the clergy are at present drawn largely from the educated and comparatively well-to-do classes; and to expect that such men will be able to relinquish their scholarship and their accustomed habits of life, as they would have to do if their iucomes are to be reduced to that of an artisan, is to expect far too much of human nature. But Ido not for a moment think that the more sensible of the laity desire to have such clergy. J. hey want their clergy to be men, at least, of some learning, and men also with whom they can mix on equal terms. They prefer them to have had au university education, and generally to be men able to hold their own in a way impossible to those who live continually under the pressure of a straitened income. And if they desire to have clergy of this sort, I repeat that they must provide these clergy at least with the minimum income of a gentleman. If any other argument were wanting it would be this, that there would be a serious falling off in the quality of the clergy if it were to be taken for granted that the professional life of a clergyman was always to be ona of straitened means and miserable circumstances. Kα* lightened Church people must see that a failing off in the quality of the clergy would be even worse for the people than it is for the ministers. I trust, therefore, that they will open their purses accordingly and assist the vestriea in the different parishes in making up the required amounts.— Yours, &c,

W.D.L.