On Tuesday the House of Bishops of the National Assembly
passed a resolution giving " general approval " to the Revised Prayer Book (Permissive Use) Measure. Three Bishops voted against it. We have much sym- pathy with those Bishops who urged that the use of two Prayer Books, the existing one and the permissive or experimental one, side by side will lead to confusion. At the same time, we cannot agree with those who condemn revision on its merits. The Preface to the Book of Common Prayer contemplates periodic revision, and we hold that revision is already overdue. But what should be aimed at is that the stage of experiment should be as short as possible and that when the lessons of the experiment have been learned they should be incor- porated in a single revised Book of Common Prayer. We do not want more than one Prayer Book. Two Prayer Books might easily lead to three or four or more. The foundation of the Establishment would be weakened.
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