New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1917-03-12
Pastors Say Business Offers
Should Not Attract Pulpit
No $6OOa-Year Clergyman Called Of God Would Take
$4,000 Position, Asserts Dr. Carson-Dean Ciett
Defends Underpaid Preachers Act

Should a young minister drawing
$500 a year salary give up mis- profess
sion and accept a business position
offering him $1,000 yeart
This question, which now confronts
q young clergyman. has been laid be-
fore the foremost pastors OF this city,
who have answered it with remarkable
frankness.
Fifty dollars a month" says the
young clergyman in question, "are al
lowed me for groceries. milk, meat,
laundry, clothing, shoes, housefur-
nishings, fuel, doctor bills, life in
surance, books and papers. One suit
of clothes year must do me. My wife
trims her own hats and manages a
dress from the clothes given her. Ere
quently the parish has a Chicken pie
dinner and we get some Of the pro-
ceeds. A few OF my parishioners own
automobiles, and you may easily under
stand the strain put upon our re-
sources to keep up appearances and re-
main on their social plane.
my work is successful. but | have
felt the increasing financial strain be-
yond words TO tell. A business friend
has come TO me with an offer of $4,000
a year. Tha. means heaven. IL means
chance for my children. II means
education. 1t means opportunity. Yet
] am troubled. Have right to leave
my profession and enter business be-
cause 1t pays me more money!"
Views of DIR. Cadman
DR.. s. Parkes Cadman, of the Cen
trail Congregational Church, Brooklyn,
said:
There can be no question that Prot
estantism mus. face the problem Of
ministerial support. We insist upon a
married clergy, which the Roman Cath
Ollie Church does not, and the minister
has TO provide for his family as well
as for himself Nor can he in many
instances look to a protected age. IL
he is set aside by years or by infrmity
his lot is too often pi.iable. The
Anglican, Methodist and other denomi-
national bodies are making belated eff
fort to meet the grave situation, but
the average income paid the regular
clergy is lamentably insufficient, and
furnishes an illuminating contrast to
the extravagsnt sums collected by tin
erary evsngelists.
personally, and Notwithstanding a
prejudice against it, | believe that a
clergyman can in emergency follow the
example Of St Paul, who earned his
bread with his own hands, although a
man should be careful what business
he chooses, and not go into a brewery,
say. Yet the apostle also said that
they who preach the Gospel should live
by the Gospel. And the money needed
for a decent livelihood should be forth
coming, not only from gifts but from
a reduction Of unnecessary churches
erected as a tribute to UNCONVENTIONAL
pride, and not required by the spiritual
demands of the communities.
Towns of 5000 souls with twelve
churches are oyerstaffed, and these flu
tile causes starve each other as well as
starye their ministers"
Think Little of Money
"The young minister does not tell us
whether he is TO become the manager of
brewery or is 10 go into life insur-
ance," said the Rev. Charles A. Eaton.
pastor Of the Madison Avenue Baptist
Church. 81 take it that the business is
sound, morally and financially. Under
one set of conditions the action of the
young minister would be the highest
form Of Christian morality. Under an
other state of conditions it might be
the act of a moral coward.
"My firm belief is that the minis
try in this country to-day thinks as
little about money as the ministry has
ever done. This involves indescriba-
BILE sacrifice and heroism on the part
of the minister, his wife and his
family.
"The Protestant ministry at least is