The Ascension of Christ is one of the hardest articles of our Christian faith to believe, understand and communicate in the twentieth century. For a start we live in a universe of billions of galaxies each of which measured in millions of light years. The imagery of the Gospels and Christian art of a Christ rising vertically into the sky is not available to us. This problem, however is not new for us in the twentieth century. St Augustine of Hippo had already pointed out the difficulty. For us the greater difficulty is that we live in a largely materialist world, a world in which the creation and consumption of goods and wealth is at the centre of our concern. We live in a world in which science, and especially the physical sciences have studied the physical universe so thoroughly, and so successfully, that we have come to believe that the physical and material is all there is of universe. There is no room in our thinking for a dimension we might call the spiritual. Even we who are within the tradition of faith and religion, have, as people of the twentieth century, to struggle with this as we seek to understand our faith. But without a spiritual component to our world, there can be no Ascension, nor religion, nor God.

There is however a strange anomaly in our western culture. While most of our life and philosophy ignores the spiritual dimension, there is yet a great thirst for spirituality. Accounts of it keep appearing as major articles in major newspapers. Books upon books are written about spirituality in the workplace bringing much profit to their authors. Companies exist to give seminars about it. On a recent air journey, the in-flight magazine devoted several pages to an article about spirituality.

Yet when I read this material I notice several important differences between what is offered, and what I consider to be classical Christian teaching about spirituality. Often the search for spirituality is confused with a search for ethics and morality. That is not in itself unimportant, but the two are different areas of discourse. Often again, spirituality is presented as a quest for a personal inner peace or peace of mind sought through esoteric practices, drawn either from classical Christian sources or from the teachings of eastern religions or native spirituality. From a Christian perspective spirituality is about interiority, but it is about both my interiority and the interiority of the whole creation. We claim that the world and our experience of it is not just physical. There is a spiritual component, a spiritual dimension which surrounds us, is within is, and yet which transcends us. So, for the Christian faith, spirituality is not just a personal ego trip; it is about the discovery of the interiority of all things and all persons. Pop spirituality is often presented in a gnostic way as escape, escape from the limitations of body, and escape from the impingement of the world. Christian spirituality is incarnational. It is known in the experience of body and community. It is a way to the re-integration of myself with community and creation. Christian spirituality seeks a balance between interiority and outerness in life and offers a way of discovering the interconnections. As it does so it comes face to face with the struggles suffering and violence of our world. It is not a route to a superficial happiness, a good feeling, which ignores or hides from the realities of life. And certainly Christianity is not, as I read so often in the popular books, a way of getting more work out of my employees.

The question is, how, in a world where interiority or spirituality is ignored, denied, or misunderstood, do we communicate and share the riches of the Christian tradition, and awaken a deeper hunger for a deeper spirituality. One of the ways in which we strive to do that in Christ Church Cathedral is through a partnership between liturgy, music, literature, drama, film, dance and other art forms which we believe provide a way to the interior, a window on to the self , the spiritual world and God. Patrick Wedd, our director of music now takes over with some more concrete thoughts about the role of music in our spiritual and every day life.

The Dean has spoken clearly and eloquently of our materialistic society and its tendency to be out of touch with our spiritual journey. In the same way I fear that we have divorced music itself from its own spiritual life. We read of billions of dollars in sales of CD's, we hear how many millions world-wide tuned into the latest offering of the three tenors; we have turned music into a consumer commodity. Further, we have divorced much liturgical music from its intended setting; virtually the only opportunity to hear the masses of Haydn and Beethoven of the cantatas and passions of Bach is in concert halls. They have become "performance" pieces.

What happens when this music is restored to its original liturgical setting? The danger is that we automatically use our consumer mentality to evaluate what is happening. We have all heard the comments: "Now they're giving concerts on Sunday morning." "Singers are only in church for the music." "Our musicians are giving us performances, not music for worship." I hope that our intention is rather to offer the very best of music to the very best of our ability. In Psalm 33 we are encouraged to "Sing to him a new song; play skillfully on the strings, with loud shouts." It is also worth remembering that the offering of this kind of rich worship experience is the historical and traditional role of cathedrals. It seems fitting, then, that this month will see masses by Palestrina, Byrd, Haydn and Mozart as part of the Sunday Eucharist here at the Cathedral.

People sometimes find this music "non-participatory", "not accessible." This raises the question of what we mean by "participating". After all, not every member of the congregation reads scripture, leads prayers, preaches sermons of presides at the altar; we all have our own roles in the liturgical act. There are things we do altogether, and there are times when we participate by our active attention. I am reminded that one of the first suggestions I made upon arriving at the Cathedral was to discourage applause after organ postludes. The voluntaries played before and after services are linked as closely as possible with the themes of the liturgy; these are not recitals, but rather part of the act of worship.

This is not always instantly accessible music, it is not the everyday music of radio and TV, it is not "easy listening". We must, again, beware of falling into the trap of consumerism instead of worship. Our spiritual quest is not, after all, instantly accessible either; we are searching our souls and spirits for something much great than we. At the same time, several parishioners have suggested that a series of workshops or sermons on our liturgical life together and the place of music in it might go some way towards a greater understanding of why we do what we do in worship.

We offer and experience of these musical masterpieces to individuals and families who might not otherwise have a chance of hear them "live". Recently, during the singing and playing of a Mozart mass movement during communion I became aware of a mother and her two- or three-year-old daughter who had paused at the entry to the Baptistry to watch and listen. The child was wide-eyed in wonder with the beauty of what she was hearing, and the mother offered thanks to our Deacon Joyce after the service of the opportunity we had provided. Including this music also gives direct experience to the members of your choirs; we are fortunate to have not only more than thirty children but also some of the city's finest professional and amateur adults (many of whom are involved in the best "secular" music-making) faithfully devoting hours each week to provide musical leadership for us.

This series of sermons has focussed on our partnerships in the church and urban community; music and the arts are certainly a rich resource for partnership. The cathedral regularly offers concerts and recitals (by both professionals and gifted students) free of charge to the community at large. Many outside groups use the Cathedral as a venue for concerts. We regularly witness to the importance of the arts in the urban setting" dance, calligraphy, fabric arts, visual arts have all been the subject of exhibits and conferences here. And we must not forget our regular partnership with the media: Radio-Canada television broadcast of a morning Eucharist (with dance), and our weekly year-round evensong broadcast over Radio Ville-Marie.

Finally, music is a corporate act, helping us to break out of a sterile individuality. This is certainly true for those of us involved in the weekly preparation of our music, and is especially valuable training for our young people; the discipline of the "team effort" of blending our voices and striving for excellence. This is also why people have also sung together in worship, as a witness to our community of faith. And this is why we do so much singing together in the course of our weekly Eucharist; hymns, Gloria, psalms, Creed, Lord's Prayer, all help us live our mutual life as community.

It is, then, with these two hopes that we dedicate ourselves to making music at Christ Church Cathedral: that music may help us contact and expand our spiritual lives, and that it may be and expression of our journey as a community of faith.