Our name sake chapel within Salisbury Cathedral is beautiful. It is home to the Prisoners of Conscience window. This article is taken from the New York Times when the windows were installed back in 1980.
The five arched windows pull at your eyes the instant you walk into Salisbury Cathedral, for the intense cobalt blue of the sun-backed stained glass is a beacon of light among the soaring but stark grey stones of the cathedral’s vaults. This burst of glory is something new in the ancient building; the glass was installed only last May. Even those who have visited Salisbury many times will want to return to see the innovation.
The pointed Gothic lancets, as the tall and somewhat narrow windows are called, together constitute the cathedral’s ”Prisoners of Conscience Window.” The panels depict both 20th-century prisoners of conscience and the trial and crucifixion of Jesus, who is represented as a first-century prisoner of conscience. To the Very Rev. Sydney H. Evans, Dean of the Cathedral, who commissioned the windows and supervised their installation, they represent, ”the call of a man to a higher power, to the universal, uttered in a terrible moment of doubt and loneliness.’’
Even today the chapel is a focal point within the cathedral and is worth a visit in its own right. To sit, to pray, to reflect and to remember.
Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow there will be injustice in the world. This Advent as we prepare for the birth of our Lord Jesus. Let us pray for peace and injustice.
Lord Jesus,
you experienced in person
torture and death
as a prisoner of conscience.
You were beaten and flogged
and sentenced to an agonizing death
though you had done no wrong.
Be now with prisoners of conscience
throughout the world.
Be with them in their fear and loneliness,
in the agony of physical and mental torture,
and in the face of execution and death.
Stretch out your hands in power
to break their chains.
Be merciful to the oppressor and the torturer,
and place a new heart within them.
Forgive all injustice in our lives,
and transform us to be
instruments of your peace,
for by your wounds we are healed.
Amnesty International, Prayers for Peace