Benefice
['benɪfɪs] or ['bɛnɪfɪs]
Definition
(noun.) an endowed church office giving income to its holder.
(verb.) endow with a benefice.
Edited by Bessie--From WordNet
Definition
(n.) A favor or benefit.
(n.) An estate in lands; a fief.
(n.) An ecclesiastical living and church preferment, as in the Church of England; a church endowed with a revenue for the maintenance of divine service. See Advowson.
(v. t.) To endow with a benefice.
Editor: Louise
Synonyms and Synonymous
n. Ecclesiastical living.
Inputed by Elsa
Definition
n. any kind of church promotion or dignity esp. with cure of souls such as rectories vicarages and other parochial cures as distinguished from bishoprics deaneries cathedral preferments &c.: an ecclesiastical living.—adj. Ben′eficed possessed of a benefice.
Inputed by Hubert
Examples
- In all presbyterian churches, the equality of authority is perfect; that of benefice is not so. Adam Smith. An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations.
- Having a contempt for curates, whom he always called understrappers, he was resolved to be buried by a beneficed clergyman. George Eliot. Middlemarch.
- That is the well-beneficed point of view, you perceive, from which difficulties are much simplified, he ended, smiling. George Eliot. Middlemarch.
- Plenty of beneficed clergy are poorer than they will be. George Eliot. Middlemarch.
Edited by Ben