Coventry Cathedral Songs of Praise


Coventry Cathedral

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AIR-RAID SIREN WAILS

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The 14th of November 1940, is a date one city will never forget.

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That night, 568 people lost their lives and many more their homes.

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I'm standing in the centre of Coventry

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in a spire which is all that remains of a huge medieval cathedral

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destroyed during the Second World War

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in one devastating air raid

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that the perpetrators called "Moonlight Sonata".

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It was the spirit of our forefathers that built that grand building.

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I believe that that spirit is with us still

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and will help us to rebuild it one day

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when we have served and suffered a while...a little longer.

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And built again it was,

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to rise in glory 22 years after those words were spoken.

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Tonight, we celebrate the golden jubilee

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of the cathedral still known today as the new Coventry Cathedral.

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And we find out

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how a building conceived in the darkest days of the Second World War

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became an international symbol of peace and reconciliation.

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Over now to Richard Dimbleby at Coventry.

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There has been a Christian church dedicated to St Michael...

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50 years ago, on the 25th of May, 1962,

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the new cathedral of Coventry

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was consecrated in the presence of Her Majesty the Queen.

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Open the doors.

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75,000 people applied for tickets to be at the consecration

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because Coventry's story

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had caught the imagination of the whole country -

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in fact, the whole world.

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Now you will see the bishop going in procession

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down the nave of the cathedral to the crossing.

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At the crossing, he will trace, with his staff,

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the Greek letters already placed there in bronze,

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the letters, chi rho,

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the first and second letters of the word Cristeo Christus.

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We used to go to the cathedral regularly

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because my father was a chorister

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and we were told to stand very still

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and we mustn't smile or nod at Daddy because he was in the choir.

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They walked down with their books in front of them, very solemn,

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but as he got to us, he used to wink.

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On the night of the air raid, Betty was an evacuee,

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living 25 miles away in Fenny Compton.

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The whole sky was lit up.

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The dear old soul that we lodged with said,

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"ain't nobody going to be able to live in that."

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And went to bed!

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I was ten years old, so I obviously thought that I was an orphan -

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it was that bad.

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The next day, I did go

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and meet all the trains that came in to Fenny Compton station.

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On the last train, the station master said to me,

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"My dear, they won't come down."

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So I walked rather dejectedly, thinking,

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I don't know what quite's going to happen.

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On the way, I saw somebody with one of those little pencil torches

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and there was a man's voice and a child's voice

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and it was my father and our John, so I wasn't an orphan after all!

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From her father, Betty learned about the devastation of Coventry.

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Because my father was an assistant organist at the cathedral

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and also a member of the choir and a lovely bass, he was,

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he went up to the place where there had been his organ.

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There was nothing but a pile of rubble.

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He found a little bit of iron and picked it up and wept.

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Obviously, as Christians, you are taught that you don't take revenge,

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but I'm sure that the prevalent feeling,

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both in Coventry and other places, they wanted revenge.

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NEWSREEL: The cities of Great Britain salute their brothers

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in this hour of tribulation, but not defeat.

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"An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth."

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Dick Howard was the Provost of the bombed cathedral.

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He had a very different message from the newsreels.

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What we want to tell the world is this - we are trying,

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hard as it may be, to banish all thoughts of revenge...

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For anybody to start saying, "we must forgive"

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was just so alien at that time, because everything we did,

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everything we thought about was how to win the war.

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But that was his message

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and, of course, a lot of the peace work that the cathedral still does started with him.

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He was such a wonderful man.

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We're going to try and make a kinder, simpler,

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a more Christ-child like sort of world

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in the days beyond this strike.

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# Thou wilt keep him

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# In perfect peace

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# Whose mind is stayed

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# On Thee

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# The darkness is no darkness with Thee

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# But the night is as clear as the day

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# The darkness and

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# The light to thee

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# To thee

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# Are both alike

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# To thee

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# Are both alike

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# God is light

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# And in Him is like

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# God is light

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# There is no darkness at all

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# Oh, let my soul live

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# Oh, let my soul live

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# And it shall praise

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# For thine is the kingdom

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# The power and the glory

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# For thine is the kingdom

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# The power and the glory

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# Forever

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# And ever

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# Forever more

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# Thou wilt keep him

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# In perfect peace

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# Whose mind is stayed

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# Whose mind is stayed

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# On thee

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# Is stayed

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# On Thee. #

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Architect Sir Basil Spence was chosen to design the new cathedral

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from 200 entries in an international competition.

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The day at the consecration was a proud moment

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for Sir Basil's daughter, Gillian.

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Do you think that the cathedral itself

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is an expression of your father's own faith?

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Yes, I do think so, very strongly.

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I think he'd been through the war and everything,

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and he'd just felt that this was a time for rebuilding

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in every sense of the word. Rebuilding morally, spiritually.

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Of course it was replacing this wonderful medieval cathedral

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and yet the design was ultra-modern.

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What was the reaction to that?

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Well, it was very mixed and the problem was

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what they showed first were the cathedral competition drawings.

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Now, these are architect's drawings

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and they're very difficult to understand.

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Anthony Blee was Sir Basil's assistant. He believes that

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one of the architect's greatest achievements

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was to keep all of the old cathedral ruins as part of the new design

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and to link them through an ancient pedestrian right of way.

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By doing that, he almost encouraged people to enter the cathedral

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before they even knew they were there,

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because suddenly you're confronted by this great west screen in glass.

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Spiritually you enter the building at that point.

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So that was an act of genius, I think, to do that.

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The other remarkable thing was that the art is not applied afterwards

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as a bolt-on goodie, but an integral part

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of the concept of the design right from the start.

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And that's terribly important.

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John Piper's Baptistery window, the knave windows,

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the Sutherland tapestry, the Epstein sculpture of St Michael.

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But you two have another very special reason

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for being particularly fond of Coventry Cathedral, don't you?

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Yes, we do, yes, we do, because we were married there.

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-The cathedral wasn't finished.

-No.

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The walls were half built and it was a very cold, misty February day.

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And I had a lilac dress, long,

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which dragged across the mud and the puddles.

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But it was a consecrated chapel

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and we thought this would be the most wonderful place to be married.

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When your father saw the cathedral finished,

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was he happy with his work?

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I think he was very happy.

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It was very true to its time, that design,

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and that's why it is so strong, I think,

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because it radiates the faith and the power

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and the optimism of that age.

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People have described it as a kind of resurrection.

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Well, it was, it was a phoenix from the ashes.

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Literally from the ashes of the old cathedral.

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Over the last 50 years, Coventry Cathedral has developed

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an international reputation for its work towards peace.

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This has led to the creation of a unique role.

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David Porter is the current Canon Director for Reconciliation.

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So is reconciliation actually possible?

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I think some of the things people look on as reconciliation are very simplistic -

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if you do that and you do that and say this

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and relate in that way, then we're all reconciled.

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And I think sometimes that's just a load of tosh.

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I think reconciliation is a hard journey and even when we do

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get moments of reconciliation they can easily evaporate.

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If you are constantly working for peace,

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does that mean that you are a pacifist?

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No, I'm not a pacifist.

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I'm not far off it, but when you consider the injustices of our world

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and the bullies that there are who only understand a punch in the nose at times,

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I do accept that sometimes violence does need to be used

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to protect the defenceless.

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But I do think that when we do use violence

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we are actually committing sin.

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And therefore even after war, we don't come to God,

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thanking God for victory, we have to start by asking for forgiveness.

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Father, forgive.

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We have what is called the Coventry Litany of Reconciliation,

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which was written by Joseph Poole who was the first precentor

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for the new cathedral, incorporating Provost Howard's

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simple statement, "Father, forgive", which acknowledges that

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we're all responsible for the mess of our world.

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So much of what's remembered here at Coventry

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relates back to the Second World War.

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Now, many would say, that's 70 years ago, isn't it time to move on?

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At one level it is,

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but then the reconciliation that

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Coventry has had with Germany and has taken a lead in

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is the hope that we offer to the world,

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because if Germany and England can be reconciled,

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after what we did to each other from 1914 right through to 1945,

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then there is no conflict in our world today that can't be reconciled

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and that there isn't hope for.

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As an expression of the love, joy and peace...

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A very special statue was unveiled here at the cathedral recently,

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what does it represent?

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It is a gift from the Frauenkirche in Dresden

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and it is their gift to us to mark

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the 50th anniversary of the new cathedral of Coventry.

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And so we dedicated to civilian victims of aerial bombing,

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and especially the German civilians who died under allied bombing.

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For me, one of the signs of reconciliation is when

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we have the capacity to memorialise our enemy's sufferings.

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This is the first time we've actually done that

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on the site here of Coventry Cathedral.

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Three medieval nails,

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taken from the bombed ruins of the old cathedral,

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form the centrepiece of the new cathedral's high altar cross.

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This cross of nails has become

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the cathedral's international symbol of peace.

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Today, there are about 170 Cross of Nails communities around the world,

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an international network for peace.

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But the cathedral also acknowledges those who go to war on our behalf.

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Royal Navy warship HMS Diamond is affiliated to the city of Coventry.

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Last year, it was presented with a cross of nails by the cathedral.

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Ed Briggs is a serving lieutenant on the Diamond.

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I think it's very appropriate that we carry a cross on a warship

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as a reminder of that symbol of willing sacrifice

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and as a symbol of hope as well.

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People do often ask me about how I feel as a Christian,

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about being potentially asked to kill.

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There is no simple answer.

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But every time I'm asked,

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I'm forced to think through my reasons again

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and I'm reminded of my conviction

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that there are some things worth fighting for.

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The cliches, I do believe, are true -

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that evil will prevail while good men do nothing.

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Exactly 30 years ago, it was another warship, HMS Coventry,

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which carried the same cross of nails to the Falkland Islands.

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Commodore Jamie Miller was working as an interpreter on board.

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When we go into a war zone, we prepare the ship for action

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and we secure or put away loose articles

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that might cause damage if and when we get hit.

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The ship's company asked that the cross of nails

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was not put away in a safe cupboard

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but stayed out as a prominent symbol of hope, defiance, I suppose.

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Indeed, many passed it as they went to action stations for the last time.

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On 25th May 1982, HMS Coventry was attacked

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and sunk with the loss of 19 lives.

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Jamie Miller was one of the last to be rescued.

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That cross of nails was something I had passed every day

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when I girded myself for the next action or next watch.

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And it did sustain me, something tangible, and now here it is again,

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on a frontline warship, an incredible ship, HMS Diamond.

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I'm so glad it's still with us, it's still sustaining a new generation.

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Let thine eyes be opened towards this house.

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Day and night, hallow this building.

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Heavenly Father, thank you for our Golden Jubilee

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and for 50 years of proclaiming the forgiveness of Christ.

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May the love of the Father continue to draw us to Himself.

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# Laudate dominum

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# Omnes gentes

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# Laudate eum

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# Omnes populi

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# Quoninam confirmata est

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# Super nos misere cordia ejus

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# Et veritus, veritus Domini

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# Manet, manet in aeternum

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# Gloria Patri et Filio

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# Et Spiritui Sancto

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# Sicut erat in principio

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# Et nunc, et semper

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# Et in saecula saeculorum

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# Amen

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# Amen

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# Amen

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# Amen. #

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And the blessing of God Almighty, the Father,

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the Son and the Holy Spirit be with us all evermore.

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-Amen.

-Amen.

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It would be easy to think that Coventry Cathedral

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is defined by that fateful night during the Second World War.

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But, of course, there'd been Christian worship on this site

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for centuries before that and hopefully, for many years to come.

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We are going to finish with a well known hymn

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in which the second verse has been given new words

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by the Canon Presenter of Coventry Cathedral, David Stone.

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Not just to mark this 50th birthday, but the cathedral's unique mission

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for peace and reconciliation around the world.

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Next week, on Father's Day, Aled will be thinking about

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what it takes to make a great dad.

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There'll be marvellous music to mark the occasion,

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and you never know, he might even get to put his feet up!

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