A MAMMOTH campaign to raise £6.4 million and secure the long-term future of St Albans Abbey was officially launched on Friday, October 12.

Predicted to last some three years, fundraisers are gearing up for a Herculean effort to raise money for the abbey's buildings, music and educational facilities.

Campaigners hope to attract the support of local businesses, charitable organisations and residents during the appeal.

And in an innovative move, they will reward the city's ten biggest benefactors with an original piece of music written by distinguished composer Howard Goodhall.

At a prestigious launch in the Cathedral's Chapter House on Friday, Harpenden MP Peter Lilley joined local business and faith leaders to kick start the campaign, which has already received more than £1 million in donations towards its target.

The appeal's patron, the Right Reverend Christopher Herbert, Bishop of St Albans, has painted a grim picture of the city without its historical centrepiece.

"If you can picture the hill at St Albans swept clean of the Abbey, with not a brick nor a tile left, you can imagine the loss," he said.

"It would be devastating; the spiritual heart of the city and the diocese ripped out; death where there was once life; sterility where once there was hope."

The Dean of St Albans, the Very Rev Christopher Lewis, told those who had gathered for the launch that the abbey was without the historic endowments afforded to many other great churches and its future survival was dependant on local support.

Keeping it in good repair, filling it with music and educating the 15,000 schoolchildren who visit it each year has traditionally been a hand-to-mouth business costing the diocese £2,000 a day he said.

But since the campaign idea was first mooted, the project has attracted growing support from well-known personalities drawn from the world of business, politics, media and the arts.

Mr Roy Gardner, chief executive of Centrica Plc, a subsiduary of British Gas, has taken a lead role in organising the business response to the campaign.

And the conductor Sir Andrew Davis, Songs of Praise presenter Pam Rhodes, Lord Cranbourne and MP Kerry Pollard, have all pledged their loyal support.

At the launch, the campaign chairman, Richard Pleydell-Bouverie stressed that the appeal could prove to be a positive distraction for a world still reeling from the war against terrorism.

"There cannot be a better time to be emphasising the good things in the world and supporting them," he said.

"Though raising £6.4 million will be very hard work, we can show it's sufficiently important to us to ask others for financial support."

And campaign director Anthony Burns said he was confident that residents would support an appeal so central to the future of the city's character.

"The money will come substantially from the city and the wider area, charitable trusts and businesses," he said.

He explained how the campaign would reward its biggest benefactors by producing the St Albans Variations, a cycle of music mimicking an earlier creation by the late Edward Elgar.

The song cycle, which will have its debut in the abbey once the appeal's target was in sight, will be played annually every year thereafter.

While ten pieces would reflect the aspirations of the largest donors, an eleventh variation would acknowledge the contribution of the entire community.

"When one receives a gift from a friend you thank them for it.

"Every gift will be acknowledged with the gratitude it deserves," said Mr Burns.

October 17, 2001 15:21

Shannon Price