State of the Clergy Report – Part II
Last week, I began with Part I of a two-part look at the implications of the Episcopal Church State of the Clergy Report 2012. I noted how the we have been ordaining more priests and deacons than many dioceses and how we have also ordained younger clergy. This week, I need to turn to how the State of the Clergy Report does show a challenge we face here. That full report is online here: State of the Clergy 2012
Priest Compensation
While we have made significant progress in recent years, many priests in the Diocese of Georgia still make less money than those in similar parishes in other dioceses, including our neighboring dioceses of Upper South Carolina and Alabama.
The challenge simply put is this: the Episcopal Church does not place priests in congregations and as priests have choice, we have to work to attract priests that congregations want to call to ministry in this Diocese. Part of this is the diocesan culture and priests decide whether they want to be in a Diocese. Part of this is the location of the church and whether this is a fit for the clergy spouse and family. And a large part of this is that our compensation has to be competitive with other options the priests have in other dioceses.
We have lost priests over the years for not have compensation that could keep them and not gained others for not having salaries that could attract them. This is not to say that priests are not interested in following where God leads them, but that answering a call begins with a search process where the compensation is known and advertised and so priests are not likely to even consider churches which will mean a cut in pay.
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Comparing to the Community
To make sure that we are taking the local community into account, we also look for the salary and benefits of a teacher’s with a master’s degree and similar years of service and, depending on the complexity of the church administration, we look to assistant principle and principle salaries. These are people in the same community with similar benefits.
The Future of Calling Clergy
As The Episcopal Church is ordaining far fewer people than are retiring, we will continue to face a situation where we are seeking to call priests who have other options open to them. The picture is not bleak. We have been good at raising up great priests and we are improving the compensation of clergy in the Diocese. We need not be pessimistic, but I write this in order to be realistic about the challenges we face.
The Rev. Frank Logue
Canon to the Ordinary
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