Book review: Language in the Liturgy: Past, present, future by Barry Spurr

The longest by far is a detailed and polemically charged analysis of contemporary liturgical writing and experimental worship. So, not all contemporary liturgical writing is summarily dismissed as a disaster, but most of it is. When we repeat the word “holy” in singing the “Holy, holy, holy”, it is not because we cannot find other words, but because we are caught up in the ineffable. In his analysis of the language of worship, Spurr frequently cites the work of David Jasper and Cally Hammond. Here, there is high praise for Cranmer’s liturgical writing as being “pitch perfect”, but is the BCP “timeless”?