Previous Reflections

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KEY MOMENTS

Canon Edward Probert, Chancellor (Tuesday 1st April 2008)

On April 28 in1220 there was a formal ceremony of laying the foundation stones for this new Cathedral building, and many dignitaries were present and took part. Of course a lot of work had already been done before then: plans made, permissions granted, funds organised, foundations dug. In a comparable way the grand dedication of the Cathedral which took place on September 29 in 1258, and whose anniversary we are celebrating this year, did not mark the end of the work, which continued with the building of the Cloisters, Chapter House, West Front, tower and spire. Celebrations of achievements come with loose ends, because life is not normally made up of neat packages in which one thing ends before another begins. I remember the rather peculiar feeling following the birth of our first child, when it dawned on me that up until then everything had focussed towards the birth, but that with the birth nothing had finished – all had begun! Our baby daughter was alive (if invisible) before her birth, and neither more nor less so after. We set ourselves goals and targets, but the flow of life goes on through it all. We punctuate both our own lives and our common life with celebrations and key moments: birthdays, feast days, and so on. At particular stages we step back from the flow of life to enhance the moment. Ancient Greeks, who had two words for our word ‘time’, would have found this much easier to convey: on the one hand they would have thought of chronos, passing time, and on the other kairos, the particular moment. So in this year of 2008 we are offering several ‘big moments’, highlights to concentrate our attention and to enrich our common life, and these I hope are now very familiar to you. (If not, please take a leaflet which outlines the programme, or look at our website.) But a characteristic of the Cathedral in its long history is its chonological endurance – the faithful continuance here of the service of God, in season and out of season. Such honouring of God in the customary ways is the underpinning of, and essential counterpart to, the special events of this year. That most common and universal of Christian services, the eucharist, is after all described as a ‘celebration’.

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