Talk:Benefice

This article would benefit from an English translation.

The language is mangled and exceptionally technical. It also should explain clearly the relationship with building of parish churches. Does "the lack of proper training until the invention of seminaries led to illiterate priests" mean that the lack of proper training led to illiterate priests (what I would expect), or that the invention of seminaries led to illiterate priests (as it seems to read)? I don't know anything about this, but maybe: "until the invention of seminaries, the lack of proper training led to illiterate priests" would be clearer...? Msgarrett (talk) 04:23, 19 December 2007 (UTC)

NPOV problems

Historically, this article is misleading. It adopts an almost explicit post-Reformation perspective, treating the entire institution under discussion as some symptom of moral failure. Benefices were an important element of the medieval economy. Our modern squeamishness with the economic role of the medieval church shouldn't distort a normal feature of pre-16th-century Europe into "corruption" and "abuse." Let's put the POV complaints in Protestant Reformation or Counter Reformation, where they belong. 65.190.138.93 (talk) 15:23, 1 September 2008 (UTC)

I agree almost completely with this assessment. It's not POV to discuss the post-Reformation dealings with the benefice system, but it is to let it dominate the article. Reading medieval church documents, one sees few complaints with the benefice system, as it was the main way that so many workers at large institutions (cathedrals, the papal chapel, etc.) earned their pay. -- Myke Cuthbert (talk) 07:27, 29 June 2009 (UTC)

As explained below?

The current role of benefices in the RCC is alluded to but never described. What's up? Rwflammang (talk) 18:48, 10 December 2010 (UTC)

According to the Oxford Dictionary of the Chr. Ch, Vatican II called for the abandonment or reform of the system in the RCC.Jpacobb (talk) 20:46, 20 April 2012 (UTC)

Perhaps this could be added to the article. Rwflammang (talk) 23:00, 20 April 2012 (UTC)

Problems of definition and format

This article appears to speak predominantly to church benefices and gives short shrift to royal benefices of the Middle Ages. Also, the flow appears peculiar, in that it leads off with a singular modern definition in re the Church of England only, then jumps back to history leading up to the modern usage again. I will find time to flesh out the text and add depth to the definition and source material. LTC (Ret.) David J. Cormier (talk) 19:23, 29 December 2011 (UTC)

Much of the information about the C of E in the main part is apparently taken from the 1911 Enc. Brit. and needs to be updated with references to the Current Canons (section C, if I remember rightly).Jpacobb (talk) 17:47, 21 April 2012 (UTC)