Picture your pastor standing in line for food stamps. It does happen. Many clergy today find it necessary to receive government assistance to feed their families; I am one of them.
I’m a full-time pastor of an upper middle-class church of 300 members in a mainline denomination. I have a B.A. degree in psychology and a master of divinity degree from a major seminary I’ve been married twelve years and have two children. I have committed my life to Christ.
Yet the government has to supplement my income by providing food stamps as well as the Earned Income Credit, which comes through my income taxes, and the free lunch program that my daughter receives in the public school.
How can this be? Even though lay people attempt to do all they can to alleviate world suffering, they often allow their pastors to subsist On the lowest level of income possible.
My wife and I were once able to say we earned everything we received. We worked hard and were paid accordingly. In the ministry it’s different. I work all available hours as the “pastor in charge.”
Whether I work forty hours or eighty hours I receive the same salary, even though I might drive twice the number of miles and spend twice as much for expenses. The harder I work, the more unreimbursed expenses I incur.
Maybe you think my wife should work outside the home. But our children are small, and with the strains of parsonage life, we believe they need their mother’s presence.
Somehow it all seems wrong. The pastor should be free to serve God and the people who need him without having to fight the depressing battle of staying alive financially. The pastor’s children should not have to grow up in such stark contrast to the lifestyles of the children whose church he serves. They should not have to be “second-class” citizens.
If those who are lay leaders in the churches would give thought to this social problem of the twentieth-century pastor, improvements would be made. The expenses of the ministry are higher than ever and should come out of the church’s treasury. The members should sincerely try to determine what their pastor’s family needs in the way of financial support. What is your pastor doing without? More important, what is his family doing without? Are his children growing up with a good impression of the church’s love and care? Will they be able to receive the necessary education to cope in an increasingly technological world?
Is your pastor eligible for welfare?
— Anonymous
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