The Inuit Children’s Centre sponsored a fundraiser for the St. Jude’s Igloo Cathedral in Iqaluit.
A mix of traditional Inuit throat singing, children’s games and swing music echoed on the walls of the Christ Church Cathedral, as Ottawa residents gathered to help support the reconstruction of St. Jude’s Cathedral in Iqaluit.
The hope is that the Inuit cathedral will be open for December next year. The reconstruction of the igloo-shaped cathedral costs $7 million, says Garth Hampson, who organized the fundraiser.
The foundations are in place and now they wait for the 750 blocks of the igloo dome to be shipped from Vancouver. The transportation is just one factor that makes the project so much more expensive, says Hampson.
While Hampson and many others have already raised several thousand dollars, he says they are still very far from their goal. He adds that he is disappointed by the lack of attention the issue has received. “Iqaluit is so far removed that people don’t understand.”
In the 1970s, Canadian architect Ron Thom designed the St. Jude’s Cathedral which quickly became a symbol of Canada’s northern communities.
The Very Rev. Shane Parker, dean of Christ Church Cathedral, says he remembers when Inuk Bishop Paul Idlout sat down at the table of his office.
He had brought with him traditional Inuit bannock bread which was still warm after the three-hour-flight from Iqaluit.
On that day, they talked of expanding St. Jude’s Cathedral that wasn’t big enough for the community.
Not long after this meeting, the attention would turn to rebuilding the Anglican cathedral that burned down in 2005.
Ever since early European settlement, the Anglican Church has always been involved with northern communities, says Parker. But what made this cathedral special was that “all the symbols of the North were beautifully beautifully intertwined in the architecture.”
The cathedral incorporated many elements of the Inuit culture, like sleds, sealskin kneeling pads, Narwhal tusks forming the altar cross. “So it’s very much a place of the Inuit people,” says Parker, “as opposed to… a white gothic structure plopped down in Iqaluit.”
And St. Jude’s Cathedral wasn’t only a place of worship, says Hampson. “You can replace the liturgical part of things,” he says, “but it was also something that community social services really used.”
Hampson was stationed at Clyde River, Nunavut, as a police officer for three-and-a-half years. Those years spent in the north, he says, were possibly the best thing that could have happened to him and his wife. Every morning, he looked out his window and saw families leave their homes to hunt seal.
Ottawa has the second largest Inuit community in Canada, says Heidi Langille. Many Inuit living in Ottawa still have family in the North, which is why she says helping to rebuild St. Jude’s Cathedral is so important.