Most of us are familiar with the Boiling Frog Analogy: If you put a frog in boiling water, it will leap right out of the pot. If, on the other hand, you put the frog in warm water and gradually turn up the heat bit by bit, it will first be lulled into a cozy stupor, then boiled alive before it catches on.
Having never boiled anything other than lobsters, clams, and mussels, I don’t know if this story is true, but it does illustrate how even the most radical change, when introduced in increments, can lull us into a sense that all is well — until it’s too late.
Bubble, bubble, toil and trouble . . . .
Incrementalism has long been the strategy of Episcopal Church authorities in lulling the laity with warm-and-fuzzy rhetoric while radically changing our religion right under our noses. By changing the words with which we worship, they have provided justification for leftist sociopolitical initiatives. More than half the Church’s members have exited the crock-pot since the revisionists first turned on the gas. Why fight it? After being inundated with politically-correct frogwash all week long in school, workplace, and media, why listen to it on Sunday, too, when we attend church to commune with God?
Episcopalians who were here for the “Green Book” in the late 1960s will remember that fateful Sunday we first saw it in the pews. Accustomed to worshipping with the 1928 Book of Common Prayer, we asked our clergy at coffee hour, “What is this?!”
“Oh,” our rector smoothly assured us, “If we don’t like it we can always go back to the ‘old’ Prayer Book.” He reached behind his back and turned the stovetop burner from OFF to LOW.
Another “trial liturgy,” the striped “Zebra Book” replaced the “Green Book” in pew racks. More revisions were introduced, a few words at a time, so as not to alarm us.
The exodus of half the members of the Episcopal Church accelerated when the 1979 book was introduced. If you look at an an Episcopal Church-published graph of Church attendance from the 1960s to 2008, you’ll see an abrupt drop-off after introduction of the 1979 Prayer Book.
The numbers don’t lie, but how about the revisionists? When a group from ETF met with then-Presiding Bishop Frank Griswold several years ago, he kept emphasizing that church numbers are way down because of “demographic” factors and “changing times.” Church leaders are still repeating the same tiresome excuses for uncharitably driving away their brothers and sisters in Christ.
Does Church lead or follow?
Revisionists like to insist that the Church must change to accommodate the culture. They say that communicants won’t attend a church that isn’t “relevant” to their lifestyles; therefore, the Episcopal Church must change to move with the times. On the other hand, those who value holy scripture, tradition, and the practices of the Church recognize that to the revisionists down is up. The Church exists not to accommodate secular culture, but to change it for the better. A church that doesn’t lead by teaching us how to live destroys the very culture that has sustained it.
Are we a better people than we were ten, fifteen, forty years ago? Do we strive to obey the Ten Commandments more or less than we did? Do we eschew sin or embrace it? Do we practice virtues such as kindness, temperance, generosity, and others that were once taught in church? Do we love the Lord our God with all our hearts and minds and our neighbors as ourselves? What do you think?
The cook pot is nearing a rolling boil. The Church’s emboldened revisionists are busily creating rites intended to phase out marriage between one man and one woman. Isolating the Episcopal Church from the worldwide Anglican Communion, they are proceeding with rites for the ordination and consecration of “all the baptized,” including practicing homosexuals. The results of their labor will be presented to General Convention for approval in 2012. The Archbishop of Canterbury and other leaders in the global Anglican Communion continue to urge restraint.
Is God Lord or isn’t He?
Another example of the revisionists’ incrementalism is the way in which they’ve been changing The Lord’s Prayer, bit by bit. The magnificent language in which we humbly address God has existed for more than 2,000 years. The familiar words of the prayer that is central to our religion have comforted and challenged Christians for two millennia:
Our Father, who art in heaven, Hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done, On earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread. And forgive us our trespasses, As we forgive those who trespass against us. And lead us not into temptation, But deliver us from evil. For thine is the kingdom, the power, and the glory, for ever and ever. Amen.
In the 1979 Prayer Book the Lord’s Prayer remains the same in Rite I. However, in Rite II, a few word-shuffles diminish The Lord’s Prayer by watering down the language, destroying the cadence, and, finally, changing the meaning:
Our Father in heaven
hallowed be your Name,
your kingdom come,
your will be done,
on earth as in heaven.
Give us today our daily bread.
Forgive us our sins
as we forgive those
who sin against us.
Save us from the time of trial,
and deliver us from evil.
For the kingdom, the power,
and the glory are yours,
now and for ever. Amen.
“Save us from the time of trial”? What, are we criminals? How about saving us from trial liturgies and all liturgies not based on holy scripture and composed of literate, reverent, impeccable English?
Yes, words have meaning.
Since 1979, many other “trial” versions of The Lord’s Prayer have appeared in church services and online. Sometimes worshippers are given a choice to say the prayer du jour or whatever version they prefer. The ensuing cacophony, as several versions are said in unison, is reminiscent of the Tower of Babel.
Polluted waters?
More insults to our intelligence and our religion are just around the corner. For example, on the Episcopal Church website there’s a link to something called The Worship Well, http://www.theworshipwell.org.
“Welcome to the Worship Well, “ the greeting says, “the online community for sharing and creating fresh, innovative worship resources in the Episcopal Church. It’s equal parts library, laboratory, portal, and bulletin board. Draw from the Well regularly for seasonal and evergreen words (liturgies and scripture), images (art, multimedia and graphics), and sounds (music) that work in a variety of communities and contexts. Glean wisdom from the seasoned advice of peers, and stretch yourself with opportunities for continued learning and networking. Create and grow with us: share your materials, ideas, and information with the wider community. “
The Worship Well is a joint venture of Church Publishing Incorporated, the Office of Liturgy and Music, Episcopal Church and Visual Arts, and All Saints Company.
Dipping into The Worship Well, we fished out this “paraphrase” of the prayer central to our religion. But to what religion, what deity, does it refer?
“O Birther! Father-Mother of the Cosmos, focus your light within us—make it useful. Create your reign of unity now; Your one desire acts with ours, as in all light, so in all forms. Grant what we need each day in bread and insight. Loose the cords of mistakes binding us, as we release the strand we hold of others’ guilt. Don’t let surface things delude us, but free us from what holds us back. From you is born all ruling will, the power and the life to do, the song that beautifies all; from age to age it renews. Amen.”
Good Lord, deliver us. (The Litany, The 1928 Book of Common Prayer)
No matter whose calculator you use, it isn’t difficult to see that church attendance has tumbled since the first radicalized liturgy, the 1979 Prayer Book, was introduced. The exodus has continued throughout subsequent incremental changes, each of which has turned up the heat just a bit higher, now to MEDIUM, on its way to HIGH. What can the Episcopal Church possibly imagine will happen when the revisionists of its Standing Commission on Liturgy and Music further desecrate the words with which we worship? Is the Episcopal Church deliberately committing suicide? Only you, dear reader, and I, and our fellow communicants, along with a growing number of courageous bishops and clergy, can save the Church.
Make a New Year’s resolution to stand up for your faith. Talk to your parish clergy and vestry. Ask your fellow communicants to visit this ETF website for updates on our efforts to maintain our true religion through the 1928 Book of Common Prayer. Don’t leave your Church in the hands of the destroyers. Don’t give up. –Jan Mahood, ETF Editor
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