Plus, you get to keep your fees for occasional services involving people not connected to the congregation. For example 250 euros for a wedding. Plus, they pay for your lawn to be cut and lots of other stuff.
And all this is made possible by the generosity and commitment of the laity even though their congregations are usually small in number.
That's the annual stipend? How do they survive?
ReplyDelete@Chelliah
ReplyDeleteI suspect you're kidding. Given the high cost of living in Ireland, it's not a fortune--but it's certainly a decent living.
Even with the difference in the cost of living (which is not across the board - some things are actually cheaper in Ireland) it is well over twice as much as a Church of England vicar gets, especially in the city where we lose out because of the archaic and unfair mileage system for calculating car expenses.
ReplyDeleteI read it all completely wrong. I am not having a good day. Yes, I do agree that it provides a good wage.
ReplyDeletePerhaps they have better priests?
ReplyDeleteAye, and they have leprechauns in stead of trolls - the lucky buggers!
ReplyDeleteTouche
ReplyDeleteBut how many protestants are there in the Irish republic? How can you support that high a salary on such a low-and shrinking-population base?
ReplyDeletePlus, 250 E for a wedding? That's more than for a root canal and you need a lot more education to become an oral surgeon.
NiL
ReplyDeleteThe reason they can support that salary on a low population base is that, since it is a non-established church, those who belong actually contribute significant sums to the church. A Pentecostal church can support a full-time pastor with about 40 families on the membership roll. Anglicans aren't nearly as generous in giving, but in North America the typical Anglican or other mainline church with 150 or so families can support a full-time pastor.
Establishment makes a difference. In Newfoundland, where in many rural communities there is de facto establishment (there's only one church, and just about everyone is on the membership list), giving is negligible.
Spot on, Jim. It also helps that in Ireland (definitely) and in Scotland (traditionally but now to a lesser extent) the Anglican Church is the landowners' church and the congregants are stinking rich. On my interview I was driven around in a Mercedes (for the first time in my life) and then a Lexus (for the first time in my life). The previous day the funeral of the local duke (or something like that) had taken place in the church I was visiting. The church reps were a hospital consultant, a dairy farmer, a racehorse breeder and a general practitioner.
ReplyDeleteMust be MRS. Nixon, comparing a wedding to a root canal...
ReplyDelete