Alumni, faculty, and staff of National Cathedral School for Girls and St. Albans School for Boys joined the Cathedral’s family and friends on Wednesday, October 2, for a service of Choral Evensong in the great choir to honor the tenth anniversary of Canon Michael McCarthy’s arrival on the Cathedral’s staff as director of music. A […]

Washington National Cathedral welcomed Children’s Defense Fund President Marian Wright Edelman and former Surgeon General David Satcher, along with two other leading physicians, for the twenty-second national observance of Children’s Sabbath on October 20. This year’s theme, “Beating Swords into Plowshares: Ending the Violence of Guns and Child Poverty,” explored some of the interrelated factors […]

Joyful sounds filled the air around the Cathedral throughout the weekend of September 20 as musicians and community members celebrated the fiftieth anniversary of the 53-bell carillon in the Cathedral’s central Gloria in Excelsis tower. Along with the tower’s peal bells, this instrument was the gift of Ms. Bessie Juliet Kibbey (1857–1949) in loving memory […]

On Thursday, December 13, Washington National Cathedral joined with the Newtown Foundation to offer a National Vigil for All Victims of Gun Violence to mark the first anniversary of the mass shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Conn. The vigil began with calls to prayer offered by Rabbi Steve Gutow, president of the […]

Cathedral Age: How does your experience as head of the Red Cross and cabinet secretary in two administrations inform your current work? I’ve learned over 40+ years of public service that to reach major breakthroughs you have to leverage resources, encourage collaboration, invest in innovation, break down silos, and shine a light on success. It’s […]

Washington National Cathedral, in many respects, is a powerful answer to war. Pierre L’Enfant’s proposed “church for National purposes” was to offer “a proper shelter for such monuments as were voted by the late Continental Congress, for those heroes who fell in the cause of liberty, and for such others as may hereafter be decreed […]

Representatives from the entire Close community—Washington National Cathedral, its affiliated schools, the Episcopal Diocese of Washington, and the Cathedral Foundation—gathered in “fine English weather” to witness the rededication and reconsecration of the Cathedral’s iconic Bishop’s Garden on October 9. The Rt. Rev. Mariann Edgar Budde, bishop of Washington, presided with the assistance of the Very […]

On Thursday, October 31—All Hallows Eve—Cathedral Dean Gary Hall joined Bishop of Washington Mariann Edgar Budde and nearly 300 guests in the great choir for a special service of Choral Evensong honoring the Cathedral’s newest-named canons. The Rev. Kim Turner Baker was named canon pastor; the Rev. Gina Gilland Campbell was named canon precentor; Patricia […]

At the end of 2009, I noticed a blur at the edge of my right eye, as if I had caught a ghost walking out the room. I put off going to the doctor for two weeks. When I did, he told me my right optic nerve was inflamed—cause unknown—but, if left untreated, it would […]

In early August, scaffolding installation began as the first step toward a much-anticipated removal of black debris netting on the Cathedral’s main level. Once it is put in place, the Cathedral’s earthquake-repair engineering team will be able to gain close access to portions of the vaulted nave ceiling, more than 100 feet above the floor, […]