Benefice
A benefice (, in that an allod is property owned outright, not bestowed by a higher authority.
Catholic Church
Roman imperial origins
In ancient Rome a benefice was a gift of land (
Carolingian era
_by_Pope_Leo_III_(Leo_X)_Vatican_11.jpg)
In the 8th century, using their position as Mayor of the Palace,
towards the end of Charlemagne's reign it appears that a royal vassal who had satisfactorily fulfilled his duties could always look forward to the grant of a benefice in some part of the Empire. Once he had received a benefice, he would take up his residence on it; it was only rarely that a vassus casatus continued to work in the Palace.[3]
In the year 800
Middle Ages
The expanded practice continued through the Middle Ages within the European
The church's revenue streams came from, amongst other things, rents and profits arising from assets gifted to the church, its endowment, given by believers, be they monarch, lord of the manor or vassal, and later also upon tithes calculated on the sale of the product of the people's personal labour in the entire parish such as cloth or shoes and the people's profits from specific forms of likewise God-given, natural increase such as crops and in livestock.
Initially the Catholic Church granted buildings, grants of land and greater and/or lesser tithes for life but the land was not alienated from the dioceses. The Synod of Lyon of 567 annexed these grants to the churches. By the time of the Council of Mainz of 813 these grants were known as beneficia.
Holding a benefice did not necessarily imply a
Benefices were used for the worldly support of much of its pastoral clergy – clergy gaining rewards for carrying out their duties with rights to certain revenues, the "fruits of their office". The original donor of the temporalities or his nominee, the patron[n 1] and his successors in title, held the advowson (right to nominate a candidate for the post subject to the approval of the bishop or other prelate as to the candidate's sufficiency for the demands of the post).
Parish priests were charged with the spiritual and temporal care of their congregation. The community provided for the priest as necessary, later, as organisation improved, by tithe (which could be partially or wholly lost to a temporal lord or patron but relief for that oppression could be found under canon law).
Some individual institutions within the church accumulated enormous endowments and, with that, temporal power. These endowments sometimes concentrated great wealth in the mortmain ("dead hand") of the church, so called because it endured beyond any individual's life. The church was exempt from some or all taxes. This was in contrast to feudal practice where the nobility would hold land on grant from the king in return for service, especially service in war. This meant that the church over time gained a large share of land in many feudal states and so was a cause of increasing tension between the church and the Crown.[6]
Pluralism
The holder of more than one benefice, later known as a pluralist, could keep the revenue to which he was entitled and pay lesser sums to deputies to carry out the corresponding duties.
By a Decree of the Lateran Council of 1215 no clerk could hold two benefices with cure of souls, and if a beneficed clerk took a second benefice with cure of souls, he vacated ipso facto his first benefice. Dispensations could easily be obtained from Rome.
The benefice system was open to abuse. Acquisitive prelates occasionally held multiple major benefices. The holding of more than one benefice is termed pluralism (unrelated to the political theory of the same name). An English example was Stigand, Archbishop of Canterbury (1052–72).
After the
French Revolution
The
Parts of these changes remain such as the abolition of the three historic roles mentioned, and the constitution is still in force in Belgium.
Church of England
The term benefice, according to the
The spiritualities[n 2] of parochial benefices, whether rectories, vicarages or perpetual curacies, include due observation of the ordination vows and due solicitude for the moral and spiritual welfare of the parishioners.[7] The temporalities are the revenues of the benefice and assets such as the church properties and possessions within the parish.[10]
By keeping this distinction in mind, the right of
Nomination or presentation on the part of the patron of the benefice is thus the first requisite in order that a clerk should become legally entitled to a benefice. The next requisite is that he should be admitted by the bishop as a fit person for the spiritual office to which the benefice is annexed, and the bishop is the judge of the sufficiency of the clerk to be so admitted.
Parochial clergy suitability
Under the early constitutions of the Church of England a bishop was allowed a space of two months to inquire and inform himself of the sufficiency of every presentee, but by the 95th of the Canons of 1604 that interval was reduced to 28 days, within which the bishop must admit or reject the clerk. If the bishop rejects the clerk within that time he is liable to a duplex querela (Latin: "double complaint", the procedure in ecclesiastical law for challenging a bishop's refusal to admit a presentee to a benefice)
In the rare cases where the patron happens to be a clergyman (a clerk in orders) and wishes to be admitted to the benefice of his own advowson, he must proceed by way of petition instead of by deed of presentation, reciting that the benefice is in his own patronage, and petitioning the bishop to examine him and admit him.[11]
Upon the bishop having satisfied himself of the sufficiency of the clerk, he proceeded to institute him to the spiritual office to which the benefice is annexed, but before such institution could take place, the clerk had to make the declaration of assent, the
The bishop, by the act of institution, commits to the presentee the
After the bishop or his commissary has instituted the presentee, he issues a mandate under seal, addressed to the archdeacon or some other neighbouring clergyman, authorizing him to induct the clerk into his benefice – in other words, to put him into legal possession of the temporalities, which is done by some outward form, and for the most part by delivery of the bell-rope to the presentee, who then tolls the church bell. This form of induction is required to give the clerk a legal title to his beneficium,[n 3] although his admission to the office by institution is sufficient to vacate any other benefice which he may already possess.
A benefice is avoided or vacated
- by death;
- by resignation, if the bishop is willing to accept the resignation. (Before the introduction of the Church of England Pensions Board, by the 50 & 51 Vict.c. 23), any clergyman who had been an incumbent of one benefice continuously for seven years, and became incapacitated by permanent mental or bodily infirmities from fulfilling his duties, could, if the bishop thought fit, have a commission appointed to consider the fitness of his resigning; and if the commission reported in favour, he could, with the consent of the patron (or, if that is refused, with the consent of the archbishop) resign the cure of souls into the bishop's hands, and have assigned to him, out of the benefice, a retiring pension not exceeding one third of its annual value, recoverable as a debt from his successor);
- by cession, upon the clerk being instituted to another benefice or some other preferment incompatible with it;
- by deprivation and sentence of an ecclesiastical court; under the 55 & 56 Vict.c. 32), an incumbent who has been convicted of offences against the law of bastardy, or against whom judgment has been given in a divorce or matrimonial cause, is deprived, and on being found guilty in the consistory court of immorality or ecclesiastical offences (not in respect of doctrine or ritual), he may be deprived or suspended or declared incapable of preferment;
- by act of law in consequence of simony;
- by default of the clerk in neglecting to read publicly in the church the Book of Common Prayer, and to declare his assent thereto within two months after his induction, pursuant to the 14 Cha. 2. c. 4);
- more recently, also on reaching statutory retirement age.
Pluralities Act
| Pluralities Act 1838 | |
|---|---|
| Act of Parliament | |
 1 & 2 Vict. c. 106 | |
| Dates | |
| Royal assent | 14 August 1838 |
| Other legislation | |
| Amends | Augmentation of Benefices Act 1665 |
| Repeals/revokes | Benefices Act 1545 |
| Amended by | Statute Law Revision Act 1874 (No. 2) |
Status: Partially repealed | |
| Text of statute as originally enacted | |
| Text of the Pluralities Act 1838 as in force today (including any amendments) within the United Kingdom, from legislation.gov.uk. | |
Dispensation, enabling a clerk to hold several ecclesiastical dignities or benefices at the same time, was transferred to the
| Pluralities Act 1850 | |
|---|---|
| Act of Parliament | |
13 & 14 Vict. c. 98 | |
| Dates | |
| Royal assent | 14 August 1850 |
| Other legislation | |
| Amended by | Statute Law Revision Act 1875 |
| Repealed by | Church of England (Miscellaneous Provisions) Measure 1992 |
Status: Repealed | |
| Text of statute as originally enacted | |
By the Pluralities Act 1850 (
| Pluralities Acts Amendment Act 1885 | |
|---|---|
| Act of Parliament | |
Pluralities Act 1838 | |
Status: Partially repealed | |
| Text of statute as originally enacted | |
| Text of the Pluralities Acts Amendment Act 1885 as in force today (including any amendments) within the United Kingdom, from legislation.gov.uk. |
The Pluralities Acts Amendment Act 1885 (
Current usage
A benefice or living in the
The term dates from the grant of benefices by bishops to clerks in holy orders as a reward for extraordinary services.[10] The holder of a benefice owns the "freehold" of the post (the church and the parsonage house) for life.
Such a life freehold is now subject to certain constraints. To comply with European Regulations on atypical workers, the parson's freehold is being phased out in favour of new conditions of service called "common tenure".[n 5][14]
See also
Notes
- ^ A patron would typically be a Lord of the Manor, noble or monarch as they would have initially have granted the land.
- ^ It appears that the term "spiritualities" was used by a few authors to refer to the revenues received for the carrying out of spiritual responsibilities (see Chambers Twentieth Century Dictionary, 1954)
- ^ Beneficium is a third alternative word, Latin for a living or benefice.
- ^ Alternatively called the Peterpence, Dispensations, etc. Act 1534
- ^ The term "common tenure" has been chosen to describe more accurately that a benefice has nothing to do with acquiring permanently a freehold property
References
- ^ Gasthof, p. 157
- ^ Hollister, pp. 120–121.
- ^ Ganshof, p. 151
- ^ Tierney, pp. 22–23.
- ^ Tierney, pp. 45–50
- ^ Herbermann, Charles, ed. (1913). . Catholic Encyclopedia. New York: Robert Appleton Company.
- ^ a b c ODCC art Benefice
- ^ "Histoire apologétique du Comité ecclésiastique de l'Assemblée Nationale", by Durand de Maillane, in French, 1791.
- ^ Constitution Civile du Clergé (Statute in French) Titre II, art. 19.
- ^ a b . Encyclopædia Britannica. Vol. 3 (11th ed.). 1911. pp. 725–726.
- ^ a b c Church of England – Appointment of clergy based on an advowson
- ^ Blunt J.H. and Phillimore Sir W.G.F, The Book of Church Law, Rivingtons, 1885, pp. 202–203, 244.
- ^ "Canons 7th Edition". Retrieved 27 January 2016.
- ^ Q&A on Common Tenure http://www.churchofengland.org/clergy-office-holders/common-tenure.aspx
Bibliography
- Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). . Encyclopædia Britannica. Vol. 3 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. pp. 725–726.
- Coredon, Christopher (2007). A Dictionary of Medieval Terms & Phrases (Reprint ed.). Woodbridge: D. S. Brewer. ISBN 978-1-84384-138-8.
- Creagh, J. T. (1913). . In Herbermann, Charles (ed.). Catholic Encyclopedia. New York: Robert Appleton Company.
- Ganshof, F. L. “Benefice and Vassalage in the Age of Charlemagne”. Cambridge Historical Journal 6, No. 2 (1939): 147–175.
- Hollister, C. Warren, ed. Medieval Europe: A Short History. (New York: McGraw-Hill, 1994)
- ODCC = Cross & Livingstone, Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church (OUP, 1974)
- Tierney, Brian. The Crisis of Church and State 1050–1300. (Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Medieval Academy of America, 1988).