[Question:]{.underline} Protestants say that a tithe of 10% of gross income is obligatory according to Scripture. Are Catholics bound to keep this rule?
[Answer:]{.underline} The obligation of offering a tenth part of the produce as an offering to God and to His ministers is one of the legal prescriptions of the Mosaic law (Dt 14:22) that Our Lord did away with when He came to fulfill the law in his own person. It is certainly true that under the new law, as under the old, the faithful owe support to the ministers of the altar. However, since the new law is interior, it is left to the generosity of the faithful in the practice of the virtues of justice and charity to determine the quantity.
In fact, the Church has declared that support is strictly owed in justice to the ministers of the Church, and that it is not pure alms that can be withdrawn at will. The contrary opinion was one of the errors of John Wycliffe condemned at the Council of Constance in 1415 (Db 598). This is indeed a part of the natural law, that requires that those who minister receive a commensurate remuneration. It is also according to the divine law, as taught by Our Lord, “for the workman is worthy of his meat” (Mt 10:10) and by St. Paul: “Know you not, that they who work in the holy place, eat the things that are of the holy place; and they that serve the altar, partake with the altar. So also the Lord ordained that they who preach the gospel should live by the gospel” (I Cor 9:13,14). Thus it is that the Waldensian heretics had to recant the denial of this when being received back into the Church in 1208 by professing: “We believe that tithes and first fruits and oblations should be paid to the clergy, according to the Lord’s command.” (Db 427). Consequently those who refuse to contribute to the support of the Church and the clergy are guilty of two sins: they are guilty of injustice, by refusing the support that they owe, and they are guilty of a sin against religion by not contributing according to their means to the support of the Church.
In many places during the Middle Ages it became custom and particular law for the 10% figure to become obligatory, especially in the East. Bouscaren & Ellis in their Canon Law: A Text and Commentary, have this to say: “(This) has long since become obsolete except in a few churches which have kept the ancient custom by reason of local statutes” (p.747). Consequently, the Church’s law gives no precision about the quantity of the donations that are to be given in support of the clergy. The current mind of the Church on the matter is reflected in Canon 1502 of the 1917 Code: “Local statutes as well as laudable customs regarding tithes and first fruits are to be respected”.
When speaking of this issue, St. Thomas Aquinas explains why it is that the Church does not demand the 10% tithe, and why it would be disedifying and inappropriate to revive this local custom: “The ministers of the Church ought to be more solicitous for the increase of spiritual goods in the people, than for the amassing of temporal goods: and hence the Apostle was unwilling to make use of the right given him by the Lord of receiving his livelihood from those to whom he preached the Gospel, lest he should occasion a hindrance to the Gospel of Christ… In like manner the ministers of the Church rightly refrain from demanding the Church’s tithes, when they could not demand them without scandal, on account of their having fallen into desuetude, or for some other reason. Nevertheless those who do not give tithes in places where the Church does not demand them are not in a state of damnation, unless they be obstinate, and unwilling to pay even if tithes were demanded of them.” (IIaIIae, Q. 87, a.1 Ad 5).
This judicious balance of the Angelic Doctor is remarkable. The principle of contributing to the support is maintained, but the Church is not so small-minded as to insist on a certain sum or proportion, although it has the right to do so. It leaves all this in God’s hands, knowing that God will provide for all the needs of His true Church, and of the clergy who have consecrated their lives to its service. Protestants who demand a tithe err by acting as if the Mosaic law were still in vigor, by a very materialist conception of the law, centered upon temporal goods, and by failing to give due priority to the Church’s true mission — the salvation of souls.
Consequently, no Catholic should feel under any kind of moral obligation to give 10% to the support of the Church, and most importantly if it would mean sacrificing the necessities of food, clothing, shelter and transportation. Yet every Catholic is under the moral obligation to give according to their means, whether their farthing be 1%, or whether, perhaps, if they are comfortably established in life, it be closer to 20% or even more. It is for each person to decide before God what is a reasonable proportion to contribute to the support of the Church, and the Church’s charitable works, concealing his generosity, so that, figuratively at least, the right hand does not know what the left hand is doing. Nevertheless, if he is prudent he will also include this proportion, whatever he decides upon, in his budget for the month.
Answered by Father Peter Scott, SSPX.