REVIEW OF PRAYER BOOK.

Franklin Times, Volume 9, Issue 696, 3 January 1922, Page 5

REVIEW OF PRAYER BOOK.

BISHOP WELLDAN’S VIEWS.

Addessing the members, of the Readingroom Society ah Nottingham ’last .October, the Dean of* Durham (Bishop Welldon) remarked that a good 4 Churchman,; however anxiogs he might be 'fin* a revision of the Prayer Book, could not look with, any other sentiment than admiring gratitude upon the Book Of Common Prayer as it now is. But; excellent as the liturgy off the Church of England was, it had never been modified since 1662. It had remained immovable in a rapidly moving worldj of thought, and faith, "and emotion! and conviction.. He did not thinß that a Book of Common Prayer s dafl ing back over more than 250 yeafll

-could be expected to satisfy ths-

sent .age. It was not too much to say the Book of Common Prayer asi

ed three facts, of which two true only in relation to a s:

minority of the people and the tl was not true at all to-day. It assj ed the small size of parishes, j ample leisure of the people who li

in them, and their general of public affairs. There were treme instances of tacit asfcumptilH which permeated the whole Book cfl Common Prayer. How alien it seeml ed to be,, how impossible of practical effect, in a day when the population was crowding into great cities, when parishes of 15,000 to 20,000 souls were not extraordinary phenomena and when the residents 'in a parish, as sometimes happened, so far fnom being parishioners in the true sense, were little more than temporary visitors, passing from one parish to another, and from one city to another with such rapidity that the third part of a parish might have wholly changed within a single year. The Prayer Book, so far as it took for granted the personal acquaintance of every clergyman with every one of his parishioners, had become and must remain {iixH practicable in modern life. With regard to the Order for the Burial of the Dead, the only change he would Wish to make was the omission of the first of the two prayers after the actual interment, or, if it remained, to modify the unnatural expression “We give hearty thanks that it hath pleased Thee to deliver this our brother (or sister) out of the miseries of this sinful world,” and. 'to add a prayer for the soul of the departed and also a prayer for the mourners. Bishop Weldon pleaded that the Church should provide some simpler prayers, or alternative or subsidiary, to those In the present Book of Common Prayer, and allow, under due episcopal sanction,'-the introduction of extempore prayers >, divine worship. He could not refrain from throwing out the suggestion that a good deal of the language of t'e

Book of Common Prayer so * cued a little artificial upon the lips • • wor-

shippers to-day..

THE MARRIAGE SERVICE

The preface m tne Solemnisation of matrimony \yas fully distressing to many bridegrooms and brid'es in the hours of their marriage. Why should they be told that holy matrimony was “not to be taken in hand unadvisedly, liglltly or wantonly, to satisfy man’s carnal lusts and appetites, like brute beasts that have no understanding ?” Our forefathers might have spoken so, but who could speak today ? It was simply the laws of historical perspective which excused such language on such an occasion. He hoped it would disappear from the revised Prayer Book. With it perhaps might disappear the passage which says that holy matrimony, was “ordained for a remedy against sinand to avoid fornication; that such persons who have not the gift of contingency might marry and keep themselves undefiled members of Christ’s Body.”

The Book of Common Prayer reflects some features of a society which had passed or was tending to pass away. It contained too many prayers for the Kin^ - , « and those prayers were couched at tiimtis in such language as wholly misrepresented the present relation of -the Ring to his people. Whatever tended to support the theory of the divine right of kings was* or ought to be, as alien from the mind. of the Church as of the State. If there were too many prayers for,the Ring, there were too few for the people. We were living in a. democratic age. Nearly the whole world had become republican. It was essential to pray for the wisdom, justice, truth, and righteousness of the people. Bishop Welldon complained that little or no account was taken in the Prayer Book of Empire or of Christian missions. He further urged thato the clergy should be careful slur'over the prayers by their rJH| unintelligible delivery, and exprjbssedJ the opinion that every clersiyciujl should be 'taught elocution. J