church rate

American  

noun

Ecclesiastical.

1. (formerly in England and Ireland) a compulsory assessment imposed on the parishioners' holdings of houses or land in order to repair the parish church and maintain its services.

---

Etymology

Origin of church rate

First recorded in 1705–15

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

church rate

The first church rate book only begins in 1776, but it is curious as showing to whom the land then belonged. 

From Old Times at Otterbourne by Yonge, Charlotte Mary

Since 1887 a church rate has been levied on the Evangelical-Lutheran communities, and since 1904 upon the Roman Catholics also.

From Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 12, Slice 8 "Haller, Albrecht" to "Harmonium" by Various

The Quaker constables had refused to collect the church rate, and for this refusal were thrown into prison.

From The Development of Religious Liberty in Connecticut by Greene, Maria Louise

The poor rate is no longer made at the Vestry; the church rate is a thing of the past; and what is then left?

From The Hills and the Vale by Jefferies, Richard

It awakened and alarmed many of them when I said that the church must be restored, and that we must have a church rate.

From From Death into Life or, twenty years of my minstry by Haslam, William