[b]A Critique of ACNA’s Initial Report of the Prayer Book and Common Liturgy Task Force[/b]

By The Rev' d Gavin Dunbar
President, Prayer Book Society, USA
http://pbsusa.org

It is no surprise that the newly-formed Anglican Church of North America has begun already to consider the question of worship. And the “Initial Report” of the “Prayer Book and Common Liturgy Task Force” is now in circulation. Its task was to “develop a ‘theological lens’” through which a “thoroughly orthodox prayer book” might be composed. Although not without some strengths, in that it sets forth some of the chief questions to be considered, as a whole the Report is disappointing: both confused and confusing, polemical, and sometimes contradictory.

For a start, the document is too complex (a much simpler numbering system would make references easier) and somewhat disorganized. There is a confusing mismatch between what the preamble promises and what the body of the report delivers.

Such confusion suggests hasty or careless compilation, and at times the Initial Report sounds like the minutes of a disjointed, unfinished, and inconclusive discussion, rather than a coherently worked out statement. This would be reasonable, if the Initial Report confined itself to raising questions for study and discussion. In some places it does so, but in others it reaches premature conclusions, based on highly tendentious and polemical argumentation. And much of the discussion is sketchy and unfocussed.