Chapel Matters

At the start of this year one of our original stained-glass windows (of ‘The Annunciation’) was returned to us by All Saints' Anglican Church. It was originally designed and put in our school chapel in the 1950s, along with two others (the ‘Nativity’ window behind the altar, and the ‘Tree Of Life’ window behind the font). They were all made by the same artist, Roy Miller, the most well-known and most significant stained-glass artist in NZ of the 20th Century.

But when the chapel was demolished in the 1970s, all three windows were installed in All Saints. Consequently, St Hilda’s commissioned Roy Miller to make replicas of the windows for the new chapel, although he only did the Nativity and the Tree of Life windows and the Nativity one was made longer than the original to fit the new space.

If you go to All Saints, like the Year 9s did at the start of the year, you can see the originals of those two windows. And now we have been given back the original ‘Annunciation’ window. It has been a long process, with the DCC and our Boards involved, but it is very special to have it returned after over 40 years and re-installed into our newly renovated chapel.

You can read more about Roy Miller and our windows (as well as the many others which he made around New Zealand) in the book Capturing Light (2016). This idea of ‘capturing light’ is a powerful one. Stained-glass windows do not look like much from the outside of a church, but when inside, the light pours through and the glass reveals stories and symbols which can teach, inspire, and encourage us. One of the designers of Saint-Denis Cathedral near Paris, the French Abbot Suger, wrote in the 12th century that he was intrigued by the mysticism of light and wanted “the most radiant of windows” so that people’s minds would be illuminated, that they “might travel through them in their imaginations to find the light of God.”

So next time you find yourself in our school chapel, or in a Cathedral – here or overseas – take some time to enjoy the windows and the light they capture.

Jesus said, “I am the Light of the World … I have come as light into the world, so that everyone who believes in me should not remain in the darkness” (John 8 & 12).

Dr Gillian Townsley
Chaplain