When does a cathedral stop being a cathedral?

Nov 21, 2018 by

by Gavin Ashenden:

Art, Inclusion and Choosing between Mohammed and Jesus in Blackburn:

Christian Cathedrals are places of and for prayer. They mediate the presence of God. In the balance between transcendence and immanence they begin with transcendence encountered through scale, and move the pilgrim towards immanence through an encounter with the living Jesus.

Jesus is introduced to the pilgrim as the God through whom all things were made and hold together, come on a journey of suffering and triumph. Suffering because through the most profound sacrificial mystery, grasped only by the depths of the plaintive heart, he carries the impurities and imperfections of those who come to him, and cleansing, remakes them.

Triumph, because at first sight broken by death he returns, having rendered it impotent, calling those who hear his song of love on a journey through a dying that no longer has any power to hold and imprison.

The cathedral draws the pilgrim into its bowels as if drawing into the heart of Jesus.

What kind of prayer does the cathedral invite?

As the centre of a devotion forged by the experience of the apostles who turned the world upside down, when they encountered the risen Jesus, the cathedral invites prayers of exploration and prayers of praise and joy.

However, in the Church of England’s cathedral in Blackburn, this November, there was a concert to celebrate the Armistice. It featured Karl Jenkins’ the Armed Man (A Mass for Peace).

Read here

Read also: Blackburn Cathedral is Muslim territory after Islamic call to prayer by Jules Gomes, Rebel Priest

Blackburn Cathedral promises no repeat of Islamic call to prayer, by Bill Jacobs, Lancashire Telegraph

 

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