Editorial: Spiritual cost of cathedral

You have to wonder how much more the people of Christchurch can take. Their city's been smashed, almost 200 lives have been lost and, for those still living in the quake zone, constant tension has become a way of life.

The human toll is bad enough.

But not all tragic losses are necessarily human.

Last week's decision to pull down Christ Church Cathedral to a level of 2-3 metres is not one which will have been taken lightly.

The cathedral has been badly damaged over the past 18 months, with its spire snapping during the February 22 6.3-magnitude earthquake.

Ongoing shakes caused further damage to the building and the majority of expert opinion appeared to be that the structure was unable to be saved.

But despite this, it is a decision that regardless of the best intentions of recovery staff and civic authorities, will be met with a degree of disquiet.

Already, some structural engineers are claiming the cathedral is in fact able to be repaired, and the Historic Places Trust has expressed disappointment.

Both views are entirely understandable.

If there was one building which people thought of when they thought of Christchurch, the cathedral was it.

To have that building now basically torn down in the wake of the earthquakes will be another sad blow to the morale of an already battered region.

It also reinforces the fact that life will never be the same in the southern city.

While the residents of Christchurch already know this, and now live with constant reminders of the seismic upheaval of the past 18 months, the destruction of the cathedral serves as a poignant reminder to the rest of us of the scale of permanent change the city has had forced upon it.

The decision that the cathedral has to come down was not unexpected, but no less heartbreaking for that.

Of concern is speculation that the financial cost of repairing the cathedral played a part in the decision not to try and restore it to its former glory.

While times are undeniably tough and caution does need to be exercised around the cost of the Christchurch rebuild, the idea of funds being unavailable to help repair a building that means so much to so many is an uncomfortable one at best.

Just as not all losses are human, neither are all costs purely financial.

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