the ship of the fens

i love visiting old english cathedrals - i've no particular leanings towards any religion, but i do feel tranquility and a sense of the continuity of a thousand years of history, give or take a century or two, as i wander through the interiors and around the environs of these impressive medieval structures

often my visits are spontaneous - i'm usually on my way to somewhere else when i'm suddenly struck by an urge to detour to the nearest ye olde englishe towne and pass two or three pleasant hours in a stupor of peace and contemplation - not contemplation of life the universe and everything - but i find that they're great places for taking stock, reviewing and recharging the mental batteries, powered down by living too long in large cities

i always feel refreshed and positive whenever i drive away from an afternoon of directionless meanderings: gazing up at high ceilings with their magnificent arched beams, supported by thick stone columns, many with ornate statues in recesses and transitional intricate stuccoed carvings from the tops of pillars to vaulted roofs (transferring my attention to the carefully angled ceiling-reflecting mirrors once i get a crick in my neck from looking up for too long); marvelling at the beauty of medieval stained glass (those that survived the reformation) and the blurred patterns of colour they throw onto whitewashed walls as the light passes through their translucent surfaces, decrying the Victorian replacements (the nineteenth century equivalents of cecille b. demille biblical epics), and studying abstract modern windows that most cathedrals have at least one example of; stopping to read the inscriptions on the tombs of obscure bishops and clergymen, benefactors who gave generous donations to the church, thus avoiding an eternity in hell no matter what degrees of sin they committed during their lives, landed gentry powerful and rich enough to have their effigies preserved in marble, their cold hands pressed together in attitudes of prayer, the lord of the manor laid out for eternity beside his loving wife, while his mistresses probably lie buried in graveyards long since fallen into ruin and probably now covered over by a tesco superstore - the ordinary everyday people lying under shopping aisles while their administering spiritual representatives, lords and masters repose in more impressive surroundings, covered over by carved stone tablets under holier aisles, although most of their memorials now lay desecrated, a reminder of the violence of our history when henry viii's and oliver cromwell's respective armies ripped away from the stone the commemorative bronze plaques - armies of soldiers suffering from too much religious zeal or individuals with a natural disposition to violence and a spiteful desire to damage and vandalise - an attitude which has survived the centuries; then sitting in the various chapels of rememberance thinking of other soldiers from a more recent past, reading the rolls of honour and feeling thankful that i wasn't born sixty years earlier than i was or i would probably be on a memorial list or a name carved into a stone monument to the great war which my great grandfather survived mercifully intact

so it was early in june that on my way back from a weekend visit to london i saw the road sign for ely as i drove up the a11 - a cathedral which despite being so close to my home, is one i've never visited, but was always one that i kept meaning to, but for some reason, never got around to - so after 30 minutes of getting lost and driving around winding suffolk and cambridgeshire country roads, i finally came within sight of the place

ely cathedral is one of the earliest norman cathedrals built in england and was given the name 'the ship of the fens' as it was originally surrounded by the waters of the cambridgeshire fens before they were drained and the emerging land was used for farming - looking at the picture i posted at the top, you can see why the name was used - as you gazed across the flat watery fenland, it would seem to be floating on the water like a large stone ship, it's various towers giving the impression of tall masts - it's an impressive sight today when viewed from the right direction - a large structure built on rising ground, towering above the lush green fens and marshes

i had not been to fen country for at least twenty years - the last time was on a field trip from my college in 1985 - in those days i was unimpressed by, what i considered to be, a flat and featureless landscape - it's the closest thing we have in england to the landscape of holland - and, like that country, it's dotted about with its fair share of windmills - but in early june, travelling through this countryside i had only vaguely explored before, i began to feel that i had neglected this part of east anglia, an area which is really my home - i drove up roads alongside networks of long straight canals which criss-crossed drained fields once marshy and waterlogged, stared out across grasslands and fields freshly ploughed or growing with green wheat and barley beginning to ripen in the patches of early summer sunshine that were occasionally breaking through the broken grey clouds over flatlands stretching out to the horizon, punctuated by copses of trees, small farms and houses and the occasional hamlet or market town - it gave me a feeling of calmness and i was surprised that after all these years of thinking how dull this scenery was, i could actually come to an appreciation of its natural beauty - the overcast day, dark sky and sporadic showers adding to the atmosphere
















of the cathedral itself i was most impressed by two features - its huge octagonal tower, the only example of a gothic dome anywhere in the world - a tower rising up to an eight-sided lantern with intricate carvings and paintings

in contrast to this is the lady chapel which appears quite bleak - a large white-washed chapter house, the interior of which was wrecked during the dissolution of the monasteries - the mutilated statues were never replaced or restored, the preceding generations preferring to keep them as a reminder of the dangers of intolerance (and that henry viii was one of our more hateful and capricious monarchs)

my friend g. in buxton, a lay reader in our local church, of which i was a member for 15 years during my childhood and teens would say to me that the peace and tranquility i feel when i walk around these old churches and cathedrals is evidence of a spiritual connection with you-know-who - and there are times during these visits when i could almost believe in a deity of some sort - but then i also realise that part of what i'm feeling is the warmness of nostalgia - years of sunday church attendance, familiar hymns, prayers and orders of service, many of which i can still recite by rote today, being lulled by the soft voices of our priests as they recited comforting words of morning prayer or holy communion, or my favourite service of evening prayer with its collect 'lighten our darkeness we beseech thee o lord and by thy great mercies, defend us from all perils and dangers of this night", which i found quite disturbing but at the same time comforting















oxnead church, a small crumbling old norman building in the middle of the norfolk countryside, surrounded by woods and fields, a warm summer evening as the sun set - dusk turning to twilight, the birdsong fading, the final blessing, the procession back to disrobe in the makeshift choir vestry which was also the small paint-peeling belfry with its single tattered rope which we would fight over to be the one to ring the bell before the start of the service - and then walking home along footpaths, cutting through farmland, breathing in the familiar smells of freshly cut grass and night scents and feeling the stillness of the evening surrounding me - a time when i spoke the prayers and sang the hymns, but they had no spiritual value

the weakness of organised religion being the empty recital of words which lose their meaning because you don't think about what you're actually saying - that's how it was for me, anyway - a-level religious studies was the final nail in the coffin for me with organised religion - studying the book of amos, the prophet foretelling the fall of the north kingdom of israel to the assyrian empire because the people lacked spiritual awareness, the words of their religious observances devoid of real feeling and understanding - empty words spoken without real belief or faith - the meaning had been lost - that was how i felt about the church and christianity in my late teens and i never went back again - for me at that particular point in my life, christianity had become a hypocritical, meaningless travesty

but then walking around ely cathedral a few weeks ago i started thinking about my youthful disillusionment - and although i didn't have a sudden religious epiphany, i thought again that maybe part of my response to such a place was a belief in the faith of the preceding generations - those who built it and those who worshipped here - a respect and admiration for the spiritual life and goodness of individuals - that alongside the religious wars, the hypocrisies and the persecutions that various sects of the christian religion have inflicted on the world down the centuries, forcing their own interpretations of scripture on societies for their own selfish ends, there have been those who have shown that the basic simple message of christianity of love and humanity in the face of any differences (stripped of the misleading layers of meaning by scholars and religious zealots over the intervening millenia and the countless additions and changes to the scriptures by all sects in order to control the lives of their congregations) is something that can be inspirational, even if you don't have any spiritual beliefs or faith in an all supreme power