Geoffrey Cuming

Geoffrey John Cuming (1917–24 March 1988) was an English liturgist, Church of England priest who published histories on Christian liturgy. After being permanently injured prior to the Battle of Arnhem, Cuming became a priest and wrote several historical texts on Anglican liturgy, including The Durham Book on John Cosin's proposed liturgy and The History of Anglican Liturgy. His works on Early Christian liturgies included collaboration with Ronald Jasper and a posthumously published text on the Liturgy of Saint Mark. Cuming was an advisor to the Church of England's committees charged with producing new liturgical texts which produced the Alternative Service Series, Alternative Service Book, and Common Worship. He also served as an editorial secretary for the Alcuin Club and taught at St John's College, Durham.

Biography

Geoffrey John Cuming was born in 1917. Schoolmate Henry Chadwick described Cuming as "quiet and bookish". However, Cuming demonstrated "enthusiasm" as a musician. Cuming would participate in a parachute drop before the 1944 Battle of Arnhem, during resulting in a painful, lifelong back injury; Chadwick suggested that this injury may have contributed to both his reservedness and sympathy for others' suffering. Cuming would be ordained as a priest in the Church of England, serving as a pastor.

In 1961, Cuming published The Durham Book, a reprinted edition of an annotated Book of Common Prayer created by John Cosin with William Sancroft that largely failed to influence the revision process which produced the 1662 prayer book. Published by Durham University, the book was positive reviewed positively in The Journal of Theological Studies and Historical Magazine of the Protestant Episcopal Church. Cuming received a DD from the University of Oxford for the work, of which Henry Chadwick said "for the history of the Book of Common Prayer in the seventeenth century no work is more cardinal".