The Washington National Cathedral, the highest point in the capital, suffered damage in Tuesday's earthquake, with three spires in the central tower breaking off of the gothic-style building, a spokesman said.Thanks be to God that no one was injured. Prayers for all who have been affected by the earthquake.
Richard Weinberg, director of communications at the Episcopal cathedral, said the three pinnacles on the 30-story-high central tower had broken off and were lying in the grass.
"A fourth is leaning," said Weinberg. "There was other minor structural damage to buttresses and smaller pinnacles."
No one was injured from the damage, but the cathedral -- host to state funerals, and memorial services for many U.S. presidents and the site of several presidential inaugural prayer services -- was closed to the public so the building could be inspected.
Picture from Wikipedia.
UPDATE: A picture of the damaged spires many be seen at Huffington Post.
UPDATE 2: From The Lead, by Nicholas Knisely, St Stephen's Episcopal Church in Culpepper, Virginia, was so badly damaged by the quake that the building is condemned.
"The Church's One Foundation is Jesus Christ the Lord..."
ReplyDeletePrayers for the National Cathedral---and everyone else affected---as they clean up and re-build. [Remembering Christchurch NZ, as they rebuild their cathedral, too. And of course, Japan...]
It shook us real good here --but the damage to the cathedral breaks my heart.
ReplyDeleteOff to check, as soon as this is posted, if Stand Firm's thread rejoicing in the fact that this was God's sole purpose in engineering the earthquake, is up yet. Fr Troll may very well be posting along similar lines, come to think of it. Good to have so trustworthy a pair of lanterns to our feet, is it not, Mimi?
ReplyDeleteI hope the damage at the cathedral can be fixed. :(
ReplyDeletelanterns to our feet?
ReplyDeleteWell, Ms Solemnis, I'd never have thought of that myself, but now you mention it....
Cathy, I'm fairly certain the cathedral can be repaired, but not St Stephen's. I believe condemned means tearing the building down.
Im so sad that the Cathedral was damaged, and am sad to hear that St. Stephen's is beyond repair.
ReplyDeleteLike the damage that the Christ Church Cathedral in New Zealand experienced in their major earthquake, the National Cathedral, though the national place of worship, needs to look right now to how they can best serve their parish and the city.
Like with our own budgets in this time of financial crisis, they need to know how much can be repaired for safety within their budget so their outreach to the community can continued.
Ciss B, yes, indeed. Perhaps I tend to allow buildings carry more weight than they should because of our beautiful old church building, which dates back to 1844. Sometimes it's difficult to find the right balance.
ReplyDeleteCondemned doesn't necessarily mean have to be torn down, but, rather it cannot be used. Whether the church has to be torn down depends on how expensive it would be to repair it and what the repair work would entail. Figuring that out will require a closer look at the building then the quick once over the building inspectors did to determine that it wasn't usable (right now the inspectors are probably only taking really close looks at buildings that look safe to the casual eye but might not be and there are probably a lot of those).
ReplyDeleteThe church I go to has twice been condemned (1906 and 1989) and twice repaired (the first time did entail taking it down to the ground, the second wasn't quite as extensive but both took several years [the second time, I heard, one couple were so determined to marry in the church that the wedding party donned hard hats, boots, and other necessary clothing and did it anyway]).
Erp, I see at the link to The Lead that St Stephen's church can be repaired.
ReplyDeleteExtensive photo gallery on the Cathedral's web site.
ReplyDeleteConcerned to hear that Nat'l Cathedral has no insurance for this. I hope this doesn't mean money will be diverted from from outreach or that we will be asked to divert money from outreach. On the other hand this is/was a wonderful building. But God is not about buildings. Birds/nests anyone?
ReplyDeletesusankay, the cathedral has no insurance and no money to fix the building. The cathedral will need to be stabilized, but I expect the full restoration will be a long time coming.
ReplyDelete