12 FEBRUARY 1983, Page 18

It passeth all understanding

Sir: While respecting the Church of England's pursuit of its lost sheep, it seems to me that the Alternative Service Book is not just an aesthetic disaster but a blurring of Christian principle. The Book of Com- mon Prayer was written in an age of faith in words which were a precise expression of that faith; the ASB, reflecting our own times, has the banal obscurity of an income tax form.

Recently, when attending a painful funeral, I was shocked by the evasiveness of the new service. Instead of mourning, the congregation seemed to have gathered for group sedation, to be tranquillised not con- soled. There is nothing oblique in the old wording; its fault is bluntness. 'Man that is born of woman hath but a short time to live and is full of misery' is not archaic but plain English.

Though Anglicans may turn their Church into a spiritual Welfare State, no one is fooled. It's'all very well kissing and shaking hands, but the shadows still terrify: cruelty, evil, tragedy, our own destructiveness man's fallen state. If there is no sin, there can be no hope of penitence and salvation, no Christian joy.

May the Revd Peter Mullen (27 January) continue his 'masochistic' defence of the Book of Common Prayer.

Naomi May

46 Lion Gate Gardens, Richmond, Surrey