Beauty out of rubble

The story of Coventry is well-known, but our recent visit there was another step forward for me in my recent quest to understand the cross more fully, and in my thinking about how God deals with human evil. 

Coventry was bombed on the night of 14th November 1940. Two-thirds of the city was burned down in the one night - by incendiary bombs dropped by German planes. The medieval cathedral was ruined. But when the cathedral's provost viewed the destruction the following morning, his words were: "Father, forgive" : not "forgive them" - he said "forgive" - in the knowledge that in this war, untold damage had been done on all sides: German cities had been wiped out too. All humanity needs forgiving.  His decision was to preserve the ruin as a memorial, and to build a whole new cathedral to be a symbol and a place of reconciliation.

In the rubble, medieval nails were found lying, fallen from the burned roof timbers. Someone fashioned three nails into a cross, and the "cross of nails" became a symbol of peace and reconciliation. One was sent to Berlin to a church which was also bombed to pieces at that time.

The cathedral stonemason noticed that two of the charred roof timbers had fallen down in the shape of a cross. He took them and nailed them together in that formation, and set them up in the ruins, as a symbol of hope and forgiveness. Once the rubble was cleared, the charred cross was set up on an altar in the old cathedral ruins, with the words "Father, forgive" enscribed on it.

The new cathedral was finished in 1962. It is an amazingly modern, light-filled building. The cathedral has an on-going and active ministry of reconciliation. Sitting right next to the remains of the old cathedral, it is a powerful sign of hope and new life. The whole place has an amazingly peaceful, calm atmosphere, pouring balm on your soul as you wander about.

To me, the message was that although God does not prevent terrible events such as the Blitz, although mankind does wanton harm to one another, although beautiful things are destroyed and lives pointlessly taken, although we cannot explain how human beings can be so stupid, so destructive and so evil - in spite of all of that, God is there in the midst, and he shines a light of hope right into the destruction - his cross falls into the rubble as a sure sign that he has ultimately overcome all of this - there will be new life, there is always hope, there will be redemption. If we can take part in the reconciliation and offer the comfort to others, and freely forgive, we can be part of the good, not part of the evil.

So I found another piece to put into the puzzle, of the meaning of the cross.





This is a tiny replica of the cross of nails, which you can buy in the gift shop.
This cross I like.