Therefore it is extremely important not only that we have people who read well in public to perform this ministry, but also that we have a system of choosing which parts of the Bible to read in a manner which gives us both as wide a spread of the Bible as possible and also helps us to steer a course through the bible appropriate to the keeping of the Christian Year.

This system of Bible Readings in worship is called the Lectionary and on 30th November we shall be adopting the Revised Common Lectionary at St. James’s. Our current ASB Lectionary ceases to be valid anyway in 2000, but there are real advantages to using the new Lectionary.

Firstly, it is an ecumenical cycle and brings the Church of England into a common practice with the Roman Catholic Church and many other Anglican churches among others. Secondly, it is a three year cycle. This means that there is much more scope for the inclusion of biblical material than allowed for in the current two year cycle. Thirdly, in conjunction with the new Calendar for the Church of England and new Collects accompanying that Calendar, there is a much richer breadth of worship material being introduced together. The new Calendar has seen the introduction of more local variation, more twentieth century saints of the church, many more of whom are women or are from the church in the wider world.

We have purchased the large lectern copy of the Revised Common Lectionary and shall be ordering pew editions of the Lectionary for personal use. If you would like to purchase one add your name to the list in church by Sunday 7th December. The price will depend on the number we order. The standard cost is £16.99 but I hope that we can get a price of about £13.50. How about that Christmas present for the Anglican who has everything?
(P.S. I already have one!)"

Source: Brian Leathard, The Spire Magazine 1997 December