A new cathedral for the Arctic

A new cathedral is being built in the town of Iqaluit (formerley Frobisher Bay), in the most northerly diocese in the Anglican Church. Bishop Andrew Atagotaaluk made a big impression on last week's meeting of the Fellowship of the Arctic as he talked through the plans.

Bishop Andrew is the first native Inuit to become a diocesan bishop and he leads a growing church. As well as being the most northerly Anglican diocese in the world, the Arctic is also the largest at 1.5 million square miles. The population is only 55,000 and there are vast distances between settlements. Just like the UK, it's not unusal for a minister to look after several churches but in the Artic they may be many hundreds of miles apart.

The Bishop is a funny, positive, warm-hearted man whose trust in God is clear. He might have had reason to be disheartened about losing his cathedral to an arson attack in which the cross carved from narwhal tusk was taken and cut up. Instead, he spoke about all the good things that he saw and his excitement at the challenge of building a new St Jude's to serve the people.

He told us about the recent Lambeth Conference, including a shared meal with some African bishops who were amazed to meet their first eskimo. For more information about the Diocese of the Arctic, see their website at http://arctic.anglican.org/.