Sometimes, to plan arts programming at the Cathedral, I just go inside of it. Between services the empty interior hums with unaccountable stillness. It seeps toward me as I stand in the midst of its walls and pillars, carvings on or around every curve and side.
One-hundred and fifty years of continuous choral music and worship—how many hymns have been sung here? How many prayers said?
Here with me are only the remains of two-hundred people buried in floors and walls. With that sound that is not sound. Is the humming the remnant of their music and prayer? Am I making that sound too?
When I look at curved lines chasing around the bottom of a pillar, I feel jarring inside my own right elbow. The hum is broken for me with a silent clang, clang, clang—steel on stone. It is Hinton, the stone carver, and his son who spent forty years carving the entire Cathedral interior.
I imagine a chisel being chased by a mallet as if around an clock—how Hinton must have worried what he might leave incomplete.
I feel their muscle and desire every time I come here. I study a carving, find it complete, and my mind puts them down—the carver and his son at rest. I come to rest in agreement with them and us—the artists who built the Cathedral and us—and the angels in heaven and God with us. It seems we are together at this point in space and time and that there is peace.
The peace of this moment is a slate on which to write what Cathedral Arts is up to and what might interest you:
St Augustine described a sacrament as “an outward and visible sign of an inward and invisible grace.” Dean Harding goes into the sacred space of Cathedral alone once a week and speaks with a piece of its art. There is an unfolding of what these objects, created by reverent human hands, contain when they are observed and received as intended. The Dean brings us with him in both observing and receiving these hidden gems. Produced by Stephanie Durr Demers, The Art of Worship series is yours by clicking here.
Are you antsy for some fresh flowers in February and an infusion of color and texture drunk through eyes? Come to Cathedral in Bloom! As I write, twenty-five floral artists are working feverishly to bring spring to the Cathedral’s interior—Hinton the stone carver would be pleased. Perhaps you would like to join me in making art at Cathedral in Bloom this coming Saturday morning? This opportunity is free for artists. Pre-registration by the end of Friday is required—fill out this form so we know to expect you by clicking here.
Click here to join us for a Sunday afternoon Lenten retreat on March 15 with the poetry of George Herbert, led by Sister Katherine (Kitty) Hanley, CSJ, with response from Dean Harding and our Director of Music, Woodrow Bynum. Herbert—in his vision of worship and in his poetry—has a place in the Cathedral’s foundation with our other saints—let’s set aside some time to listen to God with him.
We are also looking forward to two talks on the afterlife and Christian hope at Albany’s two cathedrals at the end of March with Dr. Carol Zaleski, and the Hidden Cathedral Poetry Festival on April 25. Click on those events for more information and tickets.
And, by God’s grace and through our desire and hard work, there is much more to come.
You can always write to us at arts@cathedralofallsaints.org.
Peace.