Church of Christ preachers, it has been demonstrated, are better paid than the clergy of most Protestant churches, and their salaries bear no identifiable relationship either to educational preparation or experience, in contrast to salaries in other religious bodies. But his is not all of the story. The preacher in the pulpit also enjoys tax benefits not extended to the church secretary who gets out the weekly bulletin or the pew-sitters who pay his salary.

These facts demonstrate that the doctrines of the church may sometimes be rewritten in the halls of Congress and by the bureaucrats in their rule-making roles, claims of church autonomy to the contrary notwithstanding.

If the Restoration movement in America had a universally proclaimed plea other than "back to the Bible," it was "the universal priesthood of believers." Wherever its spokesmen went across the country, the affirmation was made that all Christians are priests of God. To this was usually added the charge that religious ignorance and disunity were rooted in the man-made institution called "clergy." Alexander Campbell thundered that "God made man, the clergy made layman." Again and again he insisted that "they have shut up everybody's mouth but their own, and theirs they will not open unless they are paid for it."

My first introduction to the view that the church had no clergy was in my childhood from the late "Elder" John R. Williams, a rugged Tennessee peripatetic who would preach to no church unless he had been instrumental in starting it. Williams scornfully refused to accept the railroad discount to clergymen and paid his full fare.

Since his day the universal priesthood doctrine has been quietly laid to rest in the Church of Christ, and a "layman" (even an elder) is less likely to appear in its pulpit than, for example, in the Methodist Church, in which special provision is commonly made for "layman Sundays." If the local Church of Christ "minister" must be absent from the pulpit for a Sunday, it is predictable that another professional will be hurried in to fill it.

With the rise of this special clergy, which the church insists on denominating "minister" rather than "pastor," it would be logical for these new "located" clergy to exploit the tax benefits written into the Internal Revenue Code for the benefit of religious divines. Such has been the case. If the ordinary church member is not aware of the tax goodies which their preacher enjoys to boost his income, he is likely to be informed on Part III, Sections 107 and 119 of the IRS Code. Section 107 has been the chief reason for the increase of church owned residences to house preachers, until today every church which can beg or borrow the money owns a "preacher's house." It must never, of course, be called a "parsonage," because that would be "just like the sects."

What does Section 107 provide? It states that the "rental value of parsonages" are excludable from the gross income of the clergyman which he must report on his income tax. Since the rental value of almost any parsonage would be at least $2,400 a year, the preacher gets the cost of his residence tax free. Sad to reflect, though the little secretary who gets out the bulletin and keeps things moving does not get one cent of tax relief for her home though she, too, is engaged in full-time religious work. If the preacher chooses to live in his own home, he gets a tax-free housing allowance to help him pay for it. But the church janitor has no such break.

Now the logical extension of Section 107 suggests that every person engaged in compensated religious work should be entitled to tax-exempt housing, provided church officials would designate that he or she is a "minister" and the employing agency would accept the finding. It is interesting to note that male professors of one of our Christian colleges, which after all are religious institutions and hold that religion permeates all classes and all activities from football to mission study, have received certification as "ministers of the gospel" and a tax exemption of $3,000 for housing. Regrettably from their point of view and in keeping with the traditional church discrimination against women, the female professors cannot receive certification and must pay the full tax bill.