NEWARK, N.J. – The Salvation Army gives its clients “soup, soap and salvation,” but the federal government says that isn’t enough – they should get the minimum wage too.

For 110 years, the non-sectarian Christian group, based five miles northwest here in Verona, has fed, sheltered and offered spiritual counsel to the people it has taken in at its adult rehabilitation centers.

In exchange for room, board and up to about $20 a week in pocket money, the beneficiaries, as the Salvation Army calls them, assist in the organization’s kitchens or unload the discarded furniture and clothes the Army collects, said William J. Moss, the attorney for the Salvation Army’s national headquarters.

One Salvation Army official in Newark described the program as “soup, soap and salvation in the name of Jesus.”

The federal government, however, sees the situation differently. The U.S. Department of Labor claims the people to whom the Salvation Army ministers are employees – exploited ones at that – and should be entitled to a minimum wage under the Fair Labor Standards Act, Moss said.

The Salvation Army contends that payment of a wage could doom the social service centers, which are kept financially afloat by a network of thrift shops they run across the country.

“The Salvation ARmy is convinced that the beneficiaries are not employees entitled to the benefits of the Fair Labor Standards Act, for the same reason that volunteers and students and trainees are not employees,” Moss said Sunday. “They are not there to exchange their services for compensation. They are there for their won benefit, to be rehabilitated.”

According to the organization, the work assignments teach the discipline of work to the emotionally and financially destitute and prepare them to become productive members of society.

The government’s action stemmed from a complaint filed by a Salvation Army client in Pittsburgh several years ago. On Sept. 7, the department concluded that the clients of the Salvation Army – which maintains more than 11,000 beds in 117 centers nationwide- are entitled to protection under the Fair Labor Standards Act. Moss said the organization was given 10 days to respond to the letter.

On Friday, Salvation Army officials sent a letter to Samuel D. Walker, acting administrator of the Labor Department’s wage and hour division, advising him they would not comply with the minimum wage demand.