Word: books
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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Such additions and permutations make the new prayer book nearly twice as thick as the 1928 edition. But even so, in the process many a burnished and beloved phrase has been edited flat or cast into outer darkness. In the marriage service, "till death do us part" becomes "until we are parted by death." In the renovated baptism, the priest will no longer pray that the child be given strength to defeat "the devil, the world and the flesh...
Also regarded by critics as a sin of omission is the new book's loss of burial service readings such as "Man, that is born of a woman, hath but a short time to live, and is full of misery. He cometh up, and is cut down, like a flower; he fleeth as it were a shadow, and never continueth in one stay...
George Gallup Jr., who is an Episcopalian as well as a pollster, reported on a national random survey of 512 Episcopal laity and 654 clergy showing that 63% of lay members still prefer the old prayer book. Only 23% are for the new. Episcopalians no longer active in the church are more heavily in favor of the 1928 book than active members, and champions of the old book feel much more strongly than those who like the new. Gallup's data also show a church divided against itself: an overwhelming 80% of the clergy favor the modern prayer book...
...survey was commissioned by the Nashville-based Society for the Preservation of the Book of Common Prayer (S.P.B.C.P.), which has 120,000 supporters...
...society is resigned to the fact that only a miracle can avert final approval of the new book next month. What it seeks is authorization from the church convention for individual parishes to use the 1928 prayer book if they wish. Given the centrality of the prayer book to church life, the way in which the convention handles popular resistance to the new liturgy could have much to do with the future fortunes of Episcopalianism...