Ryu's Blog

I went to the St. Paul’s Cathedral with a few flatmates on Christmas Eve for the midnight Eucharist. Given I haven’t been to church for a long time, my state-of-mind seemed to have changed a lot from my previous church attendances. The architecture of the Cathedral’s impressive and its grand interior reminded me of Michelangelo’s Sistine Chapel (here are some photos of the church online). And a bit surprisingly, I found I enjoyed the Baroque style church music very much. The sound of the harpsichord was lovely, the choir was professional (my friend said he felt like he’s in an opera), and the church’s well-designed acoustics further accentuated the musical effect. The music and the interior created a solemn atmosphere that invoked certain spiritual, larger-than-life experience which I very much enjoyed.

Another thought I had at the night was the similarity between the message and experience the church’s conveying and communism’s. It first came to my mind when the priest said ‘this day is the birth of hope and the death of the self’. Various messages on suppressing the self for a larger goal are at the opposite end to the Ayn Rand novel I’m reading. Given the novel’s main adversary’s the communist society, the similarly between the church and communism dawned on me. The priest talked about men’s sinfulness, the need to be saved, the wars, hatred, and fragmented family in modern world, and provided a way to salvation. The utopian future portrayed by both was also similar: one’s everlasting happiness in heaven, while the other one is on earth. There’re definitely differences between the religion and the ideology, and I believe both exist to serve a certain human needs and purposes. All said, Christmas is still my favourite holiday, and I definitely enjoyed the experience at the Cathedral.