THE P
RTAL
PORTAL NEWS Westminster Cathedral by David Chapman
Britain has an amazing collection of cathedrals . Perhaps you would like to try a little game with them . Put one cathedral into each of the following categories : ancient , dramatic , small , modern , too big , eccentric , forbidding , welcoming , ugly , beautiful - the list could go on .
Now did you put Westminster Cathedral into any of those categories ? Most of you reading this will be Catholics of one sort or another , so it is quite likely . After all , even rather stuffy writers on English Cathedrals usually manage to include it somewhere towards the back of their books - perhaps because it begins with W , though I ‘ m not certain that is the reason . What is it about this curious building - run up on the cheap , in brick rather than the traditional stone ( or the later concrete !), unlike any other building in Britain , only half-finished inside and on a cramped site at the unfashionable end of one of the ugliest streets in London ?
Defining Moment
Westminster Cathedral holds a defining moment in my Christian journey . By Holy Week 1995 I had been a Roman Catholic for just a few months . I attended the Mass of the Chrism , always held in Westminster on the Tuesday of Holy Week , and was sitting at the back . The huge procession of clergy entered - it took some time as distances in this building are vast . Bringing up the rear was the tall , dignified figure of Cardinal Basil Hume . Eventually he raised his hand in the sign of the cross - “ In the name of the Father ….” - and it was at that moment , when every person in the building made the same simple gesture that I suddenly realised “ Wow ! I really am part of all this !”
February 2011 Page 4
You always meet friends in the Confessional queue
It is perhaps in making people feel “ part of all this ” that Westminster Cathedral excels . You can wander in from the bustle of Victoria Street - no one will necessarily speak to you , no one will ask you to pay or if you are a Roman Catholic , there is no aggressive selling of guide books or cards , no audio-guides , and even if Mass is being celebrated at the distant high altar no one will mind if you stroll in and then stroll out again . Does all that sound a bit laid-back , a bit casual or even a bit disrespectful ? Perhaps it does , but this great building holds a very special place in the hearts of tens of thousands of people who visit each year . The Catholic writer Joanna Bogle summed it up recently when she wrote “ A Traditional Advent ... in London has to include Westminster Cathedral . Went there for confession - you always meet friends in the confessional queue and this was no exception . Always vaguely reassuring - and the Sung Mass was beginning , with its glorious music and solemn procession …” To so many it is the most natural thing in the world to drop in to the Cathedral , to say a