‘Many clerics ready to walk away’ over 25% salary cut plan

Cash-strapped priests are facing a significant pay cut, which will see their meagre salaries plunge by 25% in the space of just two years.

Clergymen in the Dublin diocese have already seen their modest wages slashed by 15%, after two successive cuts of 6% and 9% were ordered within the space of just 12 months.

But the latest move, one of a number of tough measures drawn up by diocesan chiefs to plug a huge hole in their dwindling finances, will result in churchmen’s salaries dropping by a quarter in total in a two-year period.