Diocesan Leaders Attend Liturgical Conference
Diocesan Press Service. October 3, 1974 [74271]
Patricia Masterman, Communicant, St. Peter's Church, Amarillo, Texas
The faceless and sometimes nameless "they" who are accused of "taking away our prayerbook" appeared in the flesh for five days on ranchland outside Amarillo.
What they did was listen.
They were five members of the Standing Liturgical Commission of the Episcopal Church. Only two of them -- the staff coordinator and his assistant -- were from New York. The five of them were getting what is called "feedback" from representatives of 65 of the 93 domestic dioceses of the United States. (Every diocese had been invited to send members of its liturgical committee to the meeting.)
What's more: there were laymen -- and women -- involved in what is called "input. "
Representatives from all corners of the country were meeting Sept. 23-27 at the Conference Center of the Diocese of Northwest Texas with members of the national commission appointed to revise the prayerbook and a half-dozen members of a commission working on new church music.
Also at the meeting were a dozen members of Associated Parishes, a lobby for liturgical renewal.
The gathering -- which became a congregation thrice daily -- was a collection of 119 persons who've been doing their homework. They know not only about the Green Book (Services for Trial Use, 1971) but also about the Red Book and the Zebra Book, which some church-goers have seen only a few pages at a time in leaflet form in the pew racks.
The Red Book is a collection of new music titled Songs for Liturgy and More Hymns and Spiritual Songs. The Zebra Book is Authorized Services, 1973, Pew Edition, a paperback with a striped cover.
Not every congregation can afford to buy a book for every member.
But every member becomes involved in prayerbook revision. The Standing Liturgical Commission is a creature of the General Convention of the Episcopal Church, operating under Article X (b) of the Church Constitution.
The General Convention consists of the House of Bishops, where every diocese can be represented, and the House of Deputies, where every diocese can send a delegation of priests and laypersons.
The delegation to the House of Deputies of the General Convention of 1976 will be elected by the Council of the Diocese of Northwest Texas in Lubbock next year. Delegates to the diocesan Council will be elected at annual parish meetings by members of the congregation.
Deadline for completion of the revised prayerbook is next summer so that the manuscript can be published and distributed six months before the next General Convention in 1976.
Next step after publication is action in Minneapolis in the fall of 1976 by General Convention -- which is a two-house legislating group made up of people from dioceses of the Church.
Before any revised prayerbook replaces the 1928 edition of the Book of Common Prayer, the revised text must be approved by two consecutive General Conventions.
The General Convention meets every three years. Therefore, 1979 is the earliest date that any revision can become the official prayerbook of the Church. The 1979 General Convention, also, will be made up of people from dioceses of the Church.
Liturgical chairmen at the Amarillo conference were reporting reactions of their homefolk. Reports of diocesan chairmen have been called the most valuable resource of the commission working on the revised prayerbook.
But the vote that counts comes first in 1976 in Minneapolis.
Diocesan liturgical chairmen may or may not reflect the opinion of the delegations their dioceses will send to Minneapolis.
Sense of the meeting in Amarillo in 1974 seemed to be an acceptance if not enthusiasm for prayerbook change. Advocates of preservation of the 1928 Book of Common Prayer either kept silent, failed to attend or changed their minds before the conference ended.