HOME MISSION MATTERS

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume XLIX, Issue 16122, 10 May 1923, Page 9

HOME MISSION MATTERS

THE STRTPEND PROBLEM

■ Special to toe Heraki.t

CHRISTCHURCH, this day. At a meeting of the Christehurc] Presbytery yesterday the Rev. G P.udd, Home Missions Superintendent who at present is on a. visit to vnriou, home mission stations in Canterbury am other districts, addressed the Presby tery on home mission matters. There was an important improvemen lo be made, and that was in- the -direction of guaranteeing home missionaries stipends. lie said. At present tin method of paying l the stipend was hap hazard. It was little short of a scandal that in a church of the standing of the Presbyterian Church, which could saist (ho sum of a proximately £250,000 a year, they should be content to send out men .'into the Home Mission Held, promise them a small stipend, and give them no guarantee that all the stipend would be "paid. Sometimes that full stipend was not paid, and occassionally men and women werj at their wits' ends to live on the money they received. Mr Budd said he was amazed and delighted at the way ninny of the homo missionaries stuck to their task despite this disability. it was proposed that the minimum stipend be .£3 10s a. week, with house, ot honse allowance, with a guarantee that that would be paid. There would, perhaps, be a bigger initial expenditure, but it was hoped that the people of the home mission charges would rise to the occasion and provide the necessary money. If the standard was not, attained then the balance would he made up to the home missionary.