Solicitation of Views on the Compendium

Mike's Scaperlanda's most recent post contains some suggestions by Kevin Lee for the Catholic Legal Theory booklist.  One of Kevin's suggestions is the Compendium of the Social Doctrine of the Church, which as he observes provides a nice comprehensive overview of the Church's social teachings. Kevin suggests that "[a] close reading of [the Compendium] might make for a course on Catholic Social Teaching all by itself."  On the other side, I have also heard some critical views expressed of the book.

I'm curious about people's assessments of the Compendium both generally and specifically with respect to the following.  Last spring, when I taught my seminar in CST in the Law I assigned either the entirety of or portions of vaious encyclicals and other church documents, requiring the students to purchase the O'Brien and Shannon collection and posting links for them to other documents not included in that collection.  As we all know, many of these are not the easiest readings for students.    I'm wondering whether, when I teach the course again in the spring, I ought to consider having them purchase the Compendium instead, using primarily that rather than the original documents.  I have mixed feelings and would be grateful for the thoughts of those who have evaulated the Compendium.