It is also possible that the decision in 1891 by Bishop Temple (London) to create the office of Diocesan Reader was also one of the most significant of the period because it enabled the holder to give their own address in church at Evening Service from the lectern.

It is therefore possible that 1891 is a more appropriate date for the birth of the modern Reader's function of preaching and teaching. It is also noteworthy that the church which sought to win back Methodist Lay Preachers in 1866 took them a further twenty five years to give some of the more able ones the right to preach their own sermons.

During this period other people were questioning the role of the Parish Clerk in reading the liturgical epistle based on documents back to 878 AD that the priest should have a clerk who can read or sing the Epistle. This position was firmly rejected by the Bishop of London in 1912 who found that the only reason some Parish Clerks would have read the Epistle was that they were already clerics. The debate has been overtaken by the revisions which allow any member of the laity to read the Epistle.