The Crack in the Anglican Dam

The Fellowship of Concerned Churchmen is a blanket organization of many groups in the Episcopal Church and the Anglican Church of Canada. Ever since their respective churches voted in favor of ordaining women to the priesthood, they have been simmering. They finally reached a rolling boil on September 14 to 16, when they met in St. Louis and established the Anglican Church in North America.

If the ordination of women was the most publicized issue which has brought the Episcopal Church to the brink of schism, it is certainly not the only one. Much publicized was the proposed Book of Common Prayer, all 1,001 pages of it. Many objections have been voiced to it (mostly on linguistic grounds), but the basic objection is simple. It is not a Book of Common Prayer for Anglicans at all—it is a catalogue of religious services, and anyone from Bertrand Russell to Pope Paul could be happy with parts of it. If it is finally adopted at the General Convention of 1979 (as it assuredly will be), then the Book of Common Prayer as the stated body of worship and doctrine which has united Anglican Christians for 430 years will cease to exist in the United States.

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Sheldon Moody Smith

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The Fellowship of Concerned Churchmen is a blanket organization of many groups in the Episcopal Church and the Anglican Church of Canada. Ever since their respective churches voted in favor of ordaining women to the priesthood, they have been simmering. They finally reached a rolling boil on September 14 to 16, when they met in St. Louis and established the Anglican Church in North America.

If the ordination of women was the most publicized issue which has brought the Episcopal Church to the brink of schism, it is certainly not the only one. Much publicized was the proposed Book of Common Prayer, all 1,001 pages of it. Many objections have been voiced to it (mostly on linguistic grounds), but the basic objection is simple. It is not a Book of Common Prayer for Anglicans at all—it is a catalogue of religious services, and anyone from Bertrand Russell to Pope Paul could be happy with parts of it. If it is finally adopted at the General Convention of 1979 (as it assuredly will be), then the Book of Common Prayer as the stated body of worship and doctrine which has united Anglican Christians for 430 years will cease to exist in the United States.