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Cleric warns priests could be forced to stack shelves for extra income

Dublin priests forced to take a pay-cut as donations fall

CATHAL DERVAN,

IrishCentral Staff Writer

Published Friday, November 11, 2011, 8:16 AM

Updated Friday, November 11, 2011, 11:46 AM

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Dublin priests forced to take a pay-cut as donations fall

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The recession has hit Ireland’s priests – the clergy have been forced to take a pay-cut as donations fall and some could end up stacking supermarket shelves to make ends meet.

One outspoken cleric has claimed his colleagues could be forced to take up part-time jobs as Ireland’s economic woes spread to the Church.

Fr Joe McGuane issued the warning after Catholic priests in the diocese of Dublin saw their salaries cut by nine per cent.

The Dublin diocese is struggling to cope with the costs of clerical sex abuse scandals as revenue from donations at Mass falls dramatically.

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The Archbishop of Dublin Diarmuid Martin is already planning cost cutting measures with parish councils and finance committees after donations from the public fell by 16 per cent.

Dioceses across Ireland are suffering similar drops in revenue as they cope with the escalating cost of clerical-abuse compensation claims.

Fr Brendan Quinlivan, communications director of the Killaloe Diocese, told the Irish Independent: “What’s happening in Dublin is the trend across the country.”

The latest pay reduction is the second experienced by Dublin priests in a year after a six per cent cut in 2010.

The Independent reports that the basic income of a curate in the Dublin Archdiocese is now $33,000 a year, plus up to $4,000 depending on length of service.

Parish priests get an additional allowance of €7,000, which would bring their maximum total to €44,000.
Wages for priests in the Dublin diocese are supported by the first collection at Mass with the money then channelled into a Common Fund controlled by a committee of priests.

“When people give more to this fund, priests get more -- when it goes down, they get less,” a spokeswoman for the Archdiocese of Dublin told the paper.

Income in the diocese plummeted by $10million between 2009 and 2010, dropping from $91million to $81million.

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14 Comments

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jack4950 | Nov 14, 2011, 11:40 AM EST

go after the big boys, the vatican. not one cent goes tothem and if money has tobe paid to victims it comes out of their pockets. any church sale or chruch property locally should go towards helping those who are out of work. the little people built the churches not the vatican. why are they going scott free? Sooner Ireland divorces from the vatican better it will be. Then we can have married priests and tehir wives will make sure the money goes where it should.

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warlocks | Nov 14, 2011, 12:43 AM EST

I Wonder what Jesus would have said or Done ? IF in Fact he existed at all ? He might have said Its not my Church !

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warlocks | Nov 14, 2011, 12:30 AM EST

AS a Catholic Layman who has two close friends who are Jesuit Priests.and they work part time as social workers .I know it's not really a full time Job. many suffer from Drinking . I think all piests should be able to work out side the church if they wish. the church is on a decline . they can stop ordaining new priests but what do they expect the older priests to do ? you can't just can't dump them out on the street. or let them go on the Dole. most have spent 25 TO 40 years serving the Church and its People. Now the church wants to Cut what little money they earn. is that the thanks they Get. Let them sell off some of the stolen Gold Bootie they Vatican has Hidden away . they can well afford to.

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donal1951 | Nov 13, 2011, 09:23 AM EST

In my retirement, I am an unpaid volunteer priest for a branch of the Orthodox Church. I also have had Roman Catholic priest friends who were getting at the time about $13,000 cash money. Of course, they did get free housing and a car allowance. But still, it was nothing like $44,000 a year.

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Towngate | Nov 13, 2011, 04:39 AM EST

Forty plus grand ~ all 'found'! - for doing feck all! No wonder they are so happy to laugh up their sleeves, and take the piss out of the rest of us! @ Mamaginnty ~ okay if they are 'spreading the money around' by paying their 'workers', - but what about the army of deluded sops who 'help out at the Church' - for nothing! ~ @hybernia: Spot on! ... for 'Parish' read 'Money Farm'!

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mfinucane | Nov 12, 2011, 03:09 AM EST

about time they did some work.

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Simplify | Nov 11, 2011, 10:34 PM EST

The salary is low but the benefits are out of this world.....

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ellenfromcork | Nov 11, 2011, 04:27 PM EST

it would do them no harm to earn their own keep just like the rest of us.CitizenWhy-- you hit the nail on the head.

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hybernia | Nov 11, 2011, 01:15 PM EST

The Vatican's treasure of solid gold has been estimated by the United Nations World Magazine to amount to several billion dollars. A large bulk of this is stored in gold ingots with the U.S. Federal Reserve Bank, while banks in England and Switzerland hold the rest. But this is just a small portion of the wealth of the Vatican, which in the U.S. alone, is greater than that of the five wealthiest giant corporations of the country. When to that is added all the real estate, property, stocks and shares abroad, then the staggering accumulation of the wealth of the Catholic church becomes so formidable as to defy any rational assessment. The Catholic church is the biggest financial power, wealth accumulator and property owner in existence. She is a greater possessor of material riches than any other single institution, corporation, bank, giant trust, government or state of the whole globe. The pope, as the visible ruler of this immense amassment of wealth, is consequently the richest individual of the twentyfirst century. No one can realistically assess how much he is worth in terms of billions of dollars.

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cynicus | Nov 11, 2011, 01:09 PM EST

The sexual abuse committed by priests is not by any stretch of the wildest imagination in the least comparable with the Holocaust. Such inane statements add insult to the memory of the victims, families and survivors of the Holocaust. No-one condones sexual abuse by any person - priest or otherwise. No one cab claim that the mission of the Catholic Church today is to emulate Hitler's unspeakable evils. What happened in the Holocaust must not be trivialised by making trite comparisons with lesser evils - even evils of such great magnitude as the sexual abuse of innocents carried out by supposed "men of God.", and the evil cover-up and facilitating of such crimes by their morally-twisted superiors in the church. There can be no comparison.

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mamaginnty | Nov 11, 2011, 12:17 PM EST

Let them get rid of thier, maids, cooks and cleaners. Get rid of the huge six bedroomed homes they have, for one or two priests that are spread all over the country. For a single man 40-50.000 is a hell of a lot of money. They got free dinners after every funeral, wedding, christening you name it they got invited. No one really knows what money went through thier fingers for decades, money, homes and land left to the church in wills. Money collected at every mass was never declared because cute enough the Vatican has a charity number. They have property on Wall St that they collect ground rent from, property world wide. Trillions worth of gold and paintings in the Vatican vaults. Short of money..never. They were/are the biggest mafia in the world. It will be a long time if ever, before local clergy will know what it is like to live in the real world.

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CitizenWhy | Nov 11, 2011, 11:17 AM EST

Will never happen. There are not enough jobs to be hiring part time priests. Come to think of it, the Apostles earned their own keep.

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Collette2 | Nov 11, 2011, 10:50 AM EST

I wonder what austerity measures the prelates are making, none as far as Rome is concerned, their finances are well and truly secured.

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IAPRINCESS | Nov 11, 2011, 10:34 AM EST

Then they can grasp what the "Poor Folk" have had to do to make THEIR wnd meet!

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