[Magdalen] Proposed Property Settlement in Episcopal Litigation Turned Down

[ROGER STOKES]

I would like to add a bit more detail to Martin's comments about fund-raising in the C/E.  Historically C/E congregations did not need to pay that much to support their clergy.  I think the tipping point on that was about 1973.  Until then on the whole clergy got their income from a combination of endowments of various kinds, fees for weddings and funerals and what the faithful put in the plate on Easter Day.  Thanks to OPEC inflation really started to kick in about that time.  The revenue from endowments did not rise in line with inflation, and there was a simultaneous realisation that many clergy were not really getting a living wage.  

This meant that the congregations had to start contributing significantly to the maintenance of the clergy. This hit hard because of the rate of inflation and the effect of starting from a false zero.  It was rather like those graphs we have seen where the lower part of the y axis isn't shown so the slope of the increase is exaggerated.  Back in the day there was no proper system of clergy pensions either - priests carried on working until they dropped, sometimes in a smaller parish.  About 50 years ago there was a recognition that clergy ought to be entitled to a pension so they could retire and this was funded from the Church Commissioners' endowments.  The basis for calculating pension entitlements was determined by General Synod, but they assumed that the Commissioners would meet the bill.
Come the 1990's and there was a collapse in property prices and the Commissioners' assets slumped in value.  This prompted an actuarial assessment of their liabilities for clergy pensions.  This assessment revealed that the assets were almost totally committed to maintenance of the bishops, pensions earned by service to date and a few other things.  Pensions for future service would need to be funded by current congregations, leading to another sharp rise in what they have to pay. The result is that today's congregations have, as Martin observes,  to pretty well cover all the cost of paying their clergy and the pension contribution.
Aside from that is the maintenance of the church building.  In many rural areas this is an old building, and I mean old in British terms, not just American.  Many of them are medieval while a lot of the others are 19th century. Repairs and maintenance are expensive, sometimes requiring specialist (and hence even more expensive) workers and using techniques that are acceptable to the conservation lobby. The regular congregation in some of these churches may struggle to get into double figures.  They need to fundraise, and attract money from non-attending villagers who value the church as part of the village.
The Church is paying to maintain what is officially recognized as part of the nation's heritage.  I believe that the majority of buildings listed as being of historical or architectural interest are churches - most of them ones which are not visited by hrdes of people but which the Church has to maintain.

Roger