How can I put this nicely?

This is the Jesus Chapel in Blackburn Cathedral. I arrived here after an early start camping in the woods just outside the city. I'd been rained on the night before, slept in damp air surrounded by cold mists, and packed everything up in drizzle the next morning. After a few weeks on the road I've learned to cope with these kinds of discouraging nights, but they still sap morale a bit. I was hoping for a little something to help kickstart the day. 

And Blackburn could well have been it. The cathedral was superb. It's very modern - for a cathedral - and it looks it. And sometimes that doesn't work well; certain modern building and art styles have not worn well alongside the greatest traditions of the past (yes, brutalism, I'm looking at you and the revolting glass and concrete apocalypse you've visited on most British cities). But Blackburn shows how magnificent modern design and art can be when done right. The cathedral's main body and the Jesus Chapel were very different in style, but both really made me want to pray. I was looking forward to the service. 

I'm going to be as kind as I can, but also honest. Five minutes into the service (two clergy and two in the congregation, me and a young chap) I began to wonder exactly where else the clergy needed to be in such a hurry. The whole service was read in a flat monotone and at a pace I've only ever heard in pharmaceutical and loan ads on TV, where they have to read the small print but are paying by the second. It was incomprehensible and almost impossible to join in. It could have been so beautiful, in such a beautiful place, and instead it felt like a chore which needed to be completed as quickly as possible. 

I pray as a habit, as a discipline, as a commitment, but never as a chore. Prayer is a thing of passion, of poetry, of beauty, of pain, even of heartbreak. It can be hard work or sheer joy, it can tear you apart. But it's never just a tick on the to-do list. I left bereft. Please, Blackburn: this is the one reason you exist. Make it count. 

(Oh, and it didn't help when construction workers began drilling and hammering fifteen minutes into the service, since apparently no-one has thought to tell them that prayer would be happening and they should wait ...)

///cycles.hills.clay