The Book of Common Prayer:  E-text Edition (American, 1979)
  Version 1.0
  13 December 1993


If you are viewing this file with a word processor, we recommend you 
reformat it with a non-proportional, 10 point font, such as Courier 10.  
You should try to stop your program from automatically re-paragraphing 
the text, since line breaks are significant.

This file, which should be called BCP10.TXT or bcp10.txt, is in the 
PUBLIC DOMAIN.  You may make copies, distribute them, produce derivative 
works, reformat, and make extracts from it.  If you do so, please do not 
distribute this header along with your altered E-text.

In particular, if you remove this header, you may use this file in 
proprietary retrieval systems or embed the text in software that you 
sell.  We wish to encourage the production of hypertext systems, both 
public domain and proprietary, containing the text of the _Book of 
Common Prayer_, and also of commentaries in electronic format.

This version of the 1979 American version of the _Book of Common Prayer_ 
was edited by John E. Goodwin (jegoodwin@delphi.com).  The text was 
contributed by members of the Electronic Mailing list ANGLICAN, which is 
sponsored by American Methodist University, Washington, DC.  (The 
university has no connection with the E-text project).  

To subscribe to ANGLICAN, send the command "subscribe anglican" in the 
*body* of a message to "listserv@american.edu".  You may then send 
messages to "anglican@american.edu".  Notice that the addresses for 
sign-on and posting are different.


The base text was largely hand-typed by

  Michael I. Bushnell, of the Church of St. John Evangelist, Boston; and

  John E. Goodwin, III, of St. Charles Episcopal Church, St. Charles, 
Illinois.

Certain parts were contributed by:
  
  Barbara Bachman, St. Charles Episcopal Church

  Jim Bachman, St. Charles Episcopal Church

  John Covert, Church of the Advent, Boston

The Psalter was prepared by John E. Goodwin and Robin Cover, with the
assistance of:

  Janelle Allen
  Jo Blansett
  Michael Bushnell
  Janet Cover
  Jesse Cover
  Sarah Cover
  JoAnn Crupi
  Mike Herschenroeder
  Sherry Hines
  Steve McConnel
  Lark Rilling
  Linda Simons
  Jeanne Swanson
  John Thomson

The present text of the Psalter is generated from an SGML-tagged version 
created by Robin and Michael Cover.


The electronic edition of the BCP was prepared because all the E-text 
sources that we could find were proprietary, even though the text itself 
is guaranteed to be in the Public Domain by Canon Law.  We feel strongly 
that the basic texts of major religions, especially our own, and 
especially those used in liturgies, should be freely available in a form 
that is not restricted by a requirement of registration or payment of a 
fee.  Any fee, no matter how nominal, restricts the distribution of the 
text, prohibits its improvement by others and its inclusion in free 
software systems.  


Although this text has been checked with a spellchecker and checked for 
content by eye, we are aware that errors must still exist.**  We did not 
think this fact merited withholding the text, especially since it is 
accurate enough for devotional use, for reading to the blind, and for 
use as a base text for parish bulletins and programs.  Please send 
notice of errors more significant than simple typographical errors to 
"jegoodwin@delphi.com".

  ** In particular there are bugs in the page numbering.

This text is supported in the sense that we are committed to correcting 
errors and improving the format, e.g. to migrate to SGML.  If you need a 
highly accurate text for scholarly purposes, we recommend you contact us 
to help in the effort of preparing one.

A monograph for programmers on the markup scheme of the display format 
used and on the electronic typesetting of liturgical texts in general is 
in preparation.  We are also preparing an HTML version for posting on 
the World Wide Web (telnet info.cern.ch for more information about WWW).

=John Goodwin=
St. Charles, Illinois
Winter Embertide 1993