St John's Cathedral, Brisbane and the Anzac Legend

Foreword by the Dean

St John’s Cathedral, Brisbane, was built in three stages. When stage one was completed in 1910, just a few years before the outbreak of World War One, much of the stained glass had not been designed and installed. It is little wonder then that much of the glass commissioned in the years following the Great War should commemorate the fallen and seek ways to have the Christian faith speak to the horror of war and its aftermath. The anguish and the seeking for meaning associated with those years is forever etched into the fabric of the cathedral. In this significant book Denzil Scrivens captures the ways in which the Cathedral has been used to recording and honour the incomprehensible effects of The Great War and the subsequent conflicts that have contributed in part to the shaping of the Australian psyche. With great care and sensitivity, Denzil helps us understand the significance of the items that were gifted to the Cathedral for safekeeping by those who wanted the Cathedral to be a place of remembering and remembrance. He also takes us on a tour of the various memorials, which in many cases, record highly personalised testimonies to the cost of war. I am grateful to Denzil for this important work and for the role it will play in helping readers to appreciate the human cost of war and the need for us to be intentional in our dedication to peace making.

The Very Reverend Dr Peter Catt Anglican Dean of Brisbane

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