Christian Headlines Blog Christian Blog and Commentary

Get guidance on Bible study from C.S. Lewis - Free Course!

Quake-Damaged National Cathedral Faces Millions in Repairs

  • Religion Today Religious persecution, missions, Christianity around the world
  • Updated Aug 26, 2011

The iconic Washington National Cathedral, already struggling with financial problems, faces millions of dollars in repair costs from the damage inflicted by Tuesday's (Aug. 23) East Coast earthquake. And nothing is covered by insurance,  a church official told Religion News Service. Clergy and a team of architects and engineers spent the day after the magnitude 5.8 quake assessing the cathedral, and found significant damage, including fallen carved angels on the church's roof, cracks in flying buttresses, and missing finials from the pinnacles of the central tower. "We run a very tight budget here at the cathedral and we have had our financial challenges that we've worked through very well," the Very Rev. Samuel Lloyd, dean of the cathedral, said Wednesday. "But there is nothing in our budget that would allow us to step up and do this," he said. Officially, the cathedral is the mother church of the Episcopal Diocese of Washington, but bills itself as a "house of prayer for all people."