Easter Festival Recorded In Christchurch Cathedral

Press, Volume XCV, Issue 28258, 22 April 1957, Page 10

Easter Festival Recorded In Christchurch Cathedral

An Easter Festival of nine lessons with hymns and carols, which was recorded in the Christchurch Cathedral on Saturday evening, was broadcast over YA stations and 3YZ, Greymouth, yesterday at 2.30 pjn. The service was based on “An Easter Festival of Nine Lessons and Carols” prepared for the 8.8. C, by the Rev. Richard Tatlock.

The service began with the well-known Easter hymn “Jesus Christ is Risen Today,” from the Lyra Davidica, 1708. This was followed by an adaptation of a ninth century bidding prayer spoken by the Bishop of Christchurch (the Rt. Rev. A. K. Warren).

The Cathedral choir under the master of choristers (Mr C. Foster Browne) sang the carols, and the congregation joined in the singing of the hymns. The recording of the festival for the New Zealand Broadcasting Service was under the direction of Mr Peter Yesterday Holy Communion was held in the Cathedral at 7 a.m. and 8 a.m., and Choral Eucharist was conducted by the Dean (the Very Rev. Martin Sullivan) at 11 a.m. before a large congregation. At Evensong Bishop Warren took as his text, “That ye may know the exceeding greatness of His power to usward who believe, according to the working of His mighty power which He wrought in Christ when He raised Him from the dead.”

“The faith of the early Christians could easily have been swamped by the pagan influences of the contemporary situation; today the situation can be strangely similar,” said Bishop Warren. “St. Paul’s great desire was for his people to have clear spiritual insight and to realise the great power that God had released and demonstrated in raising Christ from the "dead.”

Bishop Warren said that if the Christian today would share in this power and appropriate it to himself, his life would bear three marks: it would show something of the power of the goodness of Jesus; something of the victory of Jesus; and would also show forth the presence of Jesus. “The Christian life must show evidence of the superb closing words of the Gospel: ‘Lo, I am with you alway, even until the end of the world,’ ” said Bishop Warren.