Folia Canonica 12. (2009)
STUDIES - Péter Artner: The remuneration of diocesan clerics
THE REMUNERATION OF DIOCESAN CLERICS 9 any benefice, i.e. if his later sustentation was not assured,9 unless the bishop provided him the sustentation10 *, as Lateran Council III in 1179 permitted. At that time not every appointment to an office included an appointment to a benefice.11 The Council of Trent ordered that every priest is to be supplied with a title which would yield a decent support for life, in sickness and in health, in good fortune and in misfortune.12 13 * 3. The 1917 Code of Canon Law Previously the words officium and beneficium were used alternately but the 1917 Code made a clear distinction between them. As it says in c. 1409: “An Ecclesiastical benefice is a juridic entity constituted or erected in perpetuity by competent ecclesiastical authority consisting of a sacred office and the right of receiving income from the assets attached to that office"'3. This meant that the ecclesiastical sustentation and office were connected inseparable. The most important is the office from which the benefice origins, as the juridic axiom declares: “Beneficium datur propter officium. ”'4 In these cases generally the income of the office was the basis of the remuneration of the clergy, which in some cases lead to huge differences. 4. The Vatican Council II Vatican II addressed the proper and equitable support of the clergy. The document, Presbyterorum Ordinis devised a new system. In no. 20 and 21 it prescribes: The system of benefices should be relinquished or reformed, and mostly the offerings of the faithful should dominate, and the bishops should admonish them concerning this obligation. In the support in general the remuneration should be fundamentally the same for all in the same circumstances, but considering the office and the conditions of time and place, and befitting the station. 9 Münsterischer Kommentar zum Codex Iuris Canonici, K. Lüdicke (Hrsg.), Essen, 1985—, c. 281/4. 10J. BANK, Kánoni jog, Budapest, 1960, I, 462. “ F. Morrisey, Property Law, Ottawa 1995—1996, 30. 12 Sess XXI, de ref., c. 2. 13 CIC 1917, can. 1409 - Beneficium ecclesiasticum est ens iuridicum a competenti ecclesiastica auctoritate in perpetuum constitutum seu erectum, constans officio sacro et iure percipiendi reditus ex dote officio adnexos. “ BANK 543.
