Per Christum Catholic Blog

I was reading some of the pieces of legislation at the 2009 Episcopal General Convention, happening now. There are your usual (and many) resolutions calling for same-sex marriage rites, and even some talk of formalizing “open communion,” but one I was reading through really bothered me, and it was B004, Hymnal Revision Study. The rationale for hymnal revision is as follows:

The world of this new millennium is very different from that of the prior century, when The Hymnal 1982 and its predecessors were created. Rapid liturgical, cultural and technological change continue to have an impact on the lives of all the faithful. A study of the need for a new hymnal for the Episcopal Church would explore sensitivity to expansive language, the diversity of worship styles, the richness of multicultural and global liturgical forms, and the enduring value of our Anglican musical heritage.

This seems to me to be code for “the old hymns aren’t politically correct enough for modern people, so let’s further chop them up so a few people on the TEC liturgical committees don’t get their heart rates up every time God is called ‘Father.’” Derek had an excellent piece up awhile back about the incessant need to tamper with the Book of Common Prayer (and was accused of being cranky by another blogger!), and I myself often wonder where the desire for constant liturgical revision comes from. Granted, I approve of the new translation of the English Catholic Mass, but that is because the new translation actually undoes some of the more radical work done by the ICEL in the past.

When I was in Episcopal seminary for a quarter we started out using straight Morning Prayer from the BCP for our daily worship. Good, right? Absolutely. However, the next quarter, the plan was to begin using trial materials from “Enriching Our Worship” because the BCP wasn’t inclusive enough. This was because a few students complained about it, even though these same people changed the words to the BCP as they said then anyway (for example, all the “he” pronouns in the psalms were replaced with “she” pronouns…while, of course, everybody else read the texts as written). Mind you, besides these two people, we all loved the BCP, and ranted and raved to that effect, but the squeaky wheels get the grease. I guess my point is that I don’t think there is a strong demand to change hymns and alter the BCP, but the people “in the know” and who complain the loudest make it out that your average Christian just can’t handle more traditional liturgy.

There will be a lot of talk about this General Convention and same-sex marriage, but an even bigger issue may be liturgical issues, like “open communion,” church calendar revision, and the calls for new hymns and liturgies.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, July 1st, 2009 at 6:00 am and is filed under Anglican and Episcopal. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.