PRAYER-BOOK REVISION.

Dominion, Volume 4, Issue 1166, 17 June 1911, Page 9

PRAYER-BOOK REVISION.

SUBSTANTIA!, PROGRESS IN 1 CONVOCATION. 1 The great and difficult (ask of Pr'aycr- > book Revision has made substantial pro- • gross iin Canterbury Convocation this week (says (ho "Guardian" of May 5). The Lower House, by a more than two to o!io majority, lias accepted the recommendation of its committee that upon occasions when there are many communicants the >eelebrant may, with the consent of the Bishop, say once the full Words of Administration and then use (ho first half of the words lo each individual. In this return to the phraseology of the First Prayer-book of Edward XI there is I nothing revolutionary, nothing which i" the least ignores the historic attitude of fhu Church of England relative to the " Holy Communion. When (lie present long | formulas r.cro adopted the population of ■ England was small, and' communicants few in number. It therefore mattered ' little that the English Words of Ad- [ ministration were more than six times ; as long as the Latin ones, which preceded the First Prayer-book. Now that ! there are hundreds of communicants on great Festivals in populous parishes the ' fatigue and delay to priest and people 1 alike have become so great that an un- [ authorised practice has grown up of using ' the "half words," and the time has as- [ suredly come when what is almost a ne- ' cessity should be formally sanctioned. 1 Tlic Lower House has also passed the ' new rubric regulating the Communion of [ the. Hick. This was thq subject, of con--1 siclerable debate, yet in a House of • seventy-three only fourteen Proctors were ; found to vote against it. The rubric, indeed, will commend itself (o most people ' who have any experience of the difficul--1 tics which often surround Celebrations for tlie sick. It provides that "when (he Holy Communion cannot reverently or without grave difficulty be celebrated in private," or when there are several sick persons desirous of communicating, the 1 consecrated elements may be taken from : an open Communion in the church to the 1 sick persons. Not the least important ad--1 vantage lint will thus be secured wiH be the removal of the nr'cessity for the priest ' himself to communicate every time he 1 administers to those who aro ill. But, ; indeed, the reform was urgently called ' for on many grounds. In large parishes ■where the "sick call" is a constant realitv. rather lhan the luxury of a few well-(o'-do invalids, Hie existing arrangement is cumbrous and irreverent to the Inst degree. Like. the Word of Administration, it is a relic of the days of small populations.