Damage at the National Cathedral

RNS
Quake-damaged National Cathedral faces millions in repairs
By LAUREN MARKOE
c. 2011 Religion News Service

WASHINGTON (RNS) The iconic Washington National Cathedral, already struggling with financial problems, faces millions of dollars in repair costs from the damage inflicted by Tuesday's (Sept. 23) East Coast earthquake.

And nothing is covered by insurance, according to a church official.

Clergy and a team of architects and engineers spent the day after the magnitude 5.8 quake assessing the cathedral, and found significant damage, including fallen carved angels on the church's roof, cracks in flying buttresses, and missing finials from the pinnacles of the central tower.

"We run a very tight budget here at the cathedral and we have had our financial challenges that we've worked through very well," the Very Rev. Samuel Lloyd, dean of the cathedral, said Wednesday.

"But there is nothing in our budget that would allow us to step up and do this," he said.

Joe Alonso, the cathedral's head stone mason, said it will take years to complete the repairs.

"It's going to be millions, no doubt about it. Millions," he said. "As large as this structure is, it's all hand made."

Hit hard by the recession, the Episcopal cathedral in recent years has weathered several rounds of staff layoffs and been forced to cut programming.

The charge now, Lloyd said, is to go back to those who contributed to the construction of the cathedral, which began in 1907 and was completed in 1990.

"It was built by people from across the country who believe having this space for the nation in the heart of the nation's capital is a hugely important enterprise," said Lloyd. A new feature on the cathedral's website encourages donations.

The cathedral, the second largest in the nation, will be closed through Saturday as engineers continue to assess the damage. Church officials say they hope it will be open for Sunday services.

Officially, the cathedral is the mother church of the Episcopal Diocese of Washington, but bills itself as a "house of prayer for all people."

The earthquake and the subsequent damage "has not been a jarring thing for our faith," Lloyd said. "What it has done it challenge us to claim our faith, to go to work to make this place be as grand as beautiful and powerful as its always been."

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Wondering, a bit heretical, if it would not be better not to leave the damage as a testimony to the history of the cathedral... after all, the cathedrals in Europe show their wear and tear.

Stabilise what needs support such as the buttresses, of course, but wait to repair the others.

Anyone else agree?

Forty years later

My heart goes out to the people of Norway tonight as they contend with the shock that comes from having suffered an attack on their well-being and people. They, too, have entered this world of utter insanity where people shoot others because of some internal dissonance.

As I read the sad news of what transpired today in Oslo, I remember how as a 14 year-old I went to Norway with my aunt and uncle (they lived in the Netherlands and he was a travelling salesman so our trip also included Sweden and Denmark). Needless to say, as a fourteen year-old I did not know a whole lot but even then was aware of Norway being a 'neutral' country.

My aunt and I wandered around Oslo while my uncle did his business. It was all so civilised.

And, today, Norway has its sad day, 22-7-2011... I doubt the person responsible had any idea that he has sullied the Feast of Mary Magdalene.

May God have mercy on us all (even as the US Congress shows itself to be increasingly dysfunctional).

So scary

This trio strikes fear in my heart and mind.

Dream Act

On Friday, the Obama administration issued a memo announcing that federal immigration officials do not have to deport illegal aliens if they are enrolled in any type of education program, if their family members have volunteered for U.S. military service, or even if they are pregnant or nursing.

This new policy of “prosecutorial discretion” was quietly announced on Friday afternoon, and completely ignored by the mainstream press.

Author of Arizona’s SB1070 and Kansas’ secretary of state, Kris Kobach, told the Daily Caller: “They’re pushing the [immigration] agents to be even more lax, to go further in not enforcing the law. At a time when millions of Americans are unemployed and looking for work, this is more bad news coming from the Obama administration… [if the administration] really cared about putting Americans back to work, it would be vigorously enforcing the law.”

Late last year, the so-called DREAM Act which would give legal residency status to millions of illegal aliens who attend college or join the military was defeated in the Senate.

Every major poll has shown that the American people are overwhelmingly opposed to the DREAM Act as well as to any other form of amnesty.

Down East falls to fear mongering

So the people of Maine approved a ban on same-sex marriage to protect the sanctity of the institution of marriage. They have saved the heterosexual couples from queers marrying but not from divorce.

"The Catholic Church was a leading supporter of the repeal campaign, even asking parishes to pass a second collection plate at Sunday mass to help the cause."

How the heck does the Catholic Church manage to keep its tax-free status when it does things like this? I just don't get it.

The whole thing makes me exceedingly cranky. It is a very sad day for Maine. May the supporters of same-sex marriage keep on working for equality because the more states that have marriage equality the more power there will be to change things on a federal level (not that I expect it to change in my lifetime).

Gene's Prayer

Like everyone else out in blogland, I am posting the You Tube video of Gene Robinson's prayer yesterday. So, listen to it each time you run across it. It's worth repeating.

Episcopal Cafe has a good report on the possible reasons (excuses) why Gene's prayer wasn't broadcast. It's discouraging to say the least.

Another biggie

Just talked with a parishioner whose family (part of it at least) has left Galveston and headed north and the other part is hunkered down a bit more inland but is already getting soaked. The Galveston family runs a nursery and her son-in-law, the owner, trying to look on the light side, figures lots of people will need their yards and gardens put back together post hurricane. She said it's a slow moving storm and so wide, which means they will get even more soaked.

The five-day forecast has this suckah travelling uptoward Illinois. So when does it reach us in New England?