Where we stand.

Revision Matters is intended as a forum for Episcopalians to talk about why revision of the Book of Common Prayer matters to us and to our churches. We created this forum because we believe this is an important moment for this conversation in our church.

Our Sunday liturgies are grounded in one core, authorized text: the 1979 Book of Common Prayer. We have a variety of variously-authorized and variously-available supplemental texts, and many of our churches import or grow our own liturgical resources too, depending on local inclination and diocesan climate.

Still, the book you’ll find in nearly every Episcopal place of worship is the ’79 BCP. It’s the default and the standard, both culturally and canonically.

The ’79 BCP is the many-greats-grandchild of the first English Book of Common Prayer, published in 1549. That first book was crafted with the intention of having a liturgy in which ordinary church members can easily participate, without barriers of language or of overly-complex page turning, and have their hearts, spirits, and minds edified (according to Cranmer’s Preface to the First Book of Common Prayer, which you can find on page 866 in the back of the current BCP).

Over the centuries, and around the world, the Book of Common Prayer has been adapted, translated, and revised, in the ongoing effort to meet those intentions in new times and contexts.

It’s been nearly forty years since the current Book of Common Prayer became our official prayer book, and much of the liturgical work that fed that revision took place fifty or more years ago. It’s been a changeful half-century, and some of those changes have touched how our liturgical language means and feels.

At the 2015 General Convention, our last every-three-years legislative gathering as a denomination, a resolution was passed that asked the church’s Standing Commission on Liturgy and Music to present a plan for the comprehensive revision of the current Book of Common Prayer to the upcoming 2018 General Convention. The SCLM responded by proposing four possible paths forward for the church:

1. Full and comprehensive revision of the Book of Common Prayer beginning at the 2018 Convention;

2. Creation of a comprehensive Book of Alternative Service, with the 1979 BCP untouched;

3. Intensive church-wide conversation about whether revision of the BCP is needed or desirable, and if so, to what extent; or

4. A step back from any plans for liturgical revision or creation of new liturgical materials, and instead a commitment to deeper study of the theology of our current liturgies.

Here’s where we stand, as the voices of Revision Matters.

It doesn’t look like the Episcopal Church is ready for path 1. There clearly hasn’t been a churchwide conversation about how we’re using the prayer book, what we love about it and where it chafes or constrains.

Those who have staked a position and made a case online or in print have largely represented one side of the question. There’s a scarcity of public writing about why revision matters — and we don’t believe it’s because nobody wants revision.

Therefore, we commend Path 3 to the church: Let’s talk about this. Broadly, openly, freely.

Let’s hear a wide range of voices about what we love, what we struggle with, and what we hope for, in our life of common worship as Episcopalians and our relationship with this little red (or sometimes blue?) book.

Let’s listen too — even when it’s hard. This is tender territory; some of the words that others find hurtful or simply meaningless may be written deep in our hearts.

Revision Matters is intended to host some of that necessary conversation. We hope to welcome and curate short reflections from folks all over the church, about why prayer book revision matters to you or in your church context.

Please read, share, and if you’ve got something to contribute, write to us at bcp.revision.matters@gmail.com.

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