Forget the old adage that “cleanliness is next to godliness”. Graffiti — of a sort — is now welcomed at the spiritual home of global Anglicanism in southeast England, to the ire of US Vice President JD Vance.
A new exhibition of graffiti-style artworks posing ordinary people’s questions to God now adorns the hallowed walls of Canterbury Cathedral and has invited controversy all the way from southeast England to Washington DC.
Featuring eternal human queries like “why all the suffering?” and “are you there?”, they mark the pillars and walls of the crypt of the sixth-century cathedral in Kent, southeast of London.
The scrawls, some black-and-white and others brightly coloured, contrast with the grand stone edifices and stained-glass windows.
Exhibition curator Jacquiline Creswell told AFP she would love visitors “to spend some time looking at the questions, trying to understand the questions”.
“What I’d like most of all, is for them to feel empowered to pose their own question to God,” she added.
Creswell noted that the graffiti echoes the inscriptions that parishioners and pilgrims have carved into the walls of the building for centuries, such as crosses and christograms — many of which are still visible in the crypt.
Poet Alex Vellis spent several months working with sometimes marginalised local communities, including members of the Punjabi minority, LGBTQ+ people and neurodivergent individuals, to arrive at the assortment of questions on display.
Some challenge faith while others question the role of religion, as well as whether there is life after death.
Inside the cathedral, which will soon welcome its first female archbishop, Sarah Mullally, who will become the Church of England’s most senior cleric, visitors’ reactions were mixed Thursday.
“It devalues it,” said Paul Wilkinson, a 63-year-old Londoner.
“Graffiti is something that is on the side of trains… I just don’t think it belongs in a place like this,” he added, calling the questions “pithy little platitudes”.
“It’s not really my taste,” lamented Alan Wood, from nearby Dover. “I am more traditional.”
His friend Gale Paeony, a teacher, “can see why people might object” but noted “it makes a difference when you realise why and how it was created”.
“Young people don’t like to go to church. It is boring,” she added, suggesting it might help attract more youngsters.
Hillary Brian, living in Canterbury and in her seventies, said the cathedral “needs the money” that such an installation can bring through increased visitor numbers.
“The questions are really good. They make you think,” she added.
“There is a rawness which is magnified by the graffiti style which is disruptive,” Dean of Canterbury David Monteith wrote in the brochure available for visitors.
The exhibition has even caused a stir on the other side of the Atlantic: in US President Donald Trump’s MAGA sphere.
Vance branded it “really ugly” on X, while the platform’s billionaire owner Elon Musk argued it was symptomatic of a “relentless anti-Western propaganda” trend in which people “suicide their own culture”.
This is not the first time Canterbury Cathedral has sparked controversy.
Last year, the religious site drew heavy criticism for hosting a silent disco night that allowed people to dance while listening to music through headphones.
That has not stopped the experience from going ahead again.
The exhibition, titled “Hear us”, runs until January 18 next year.
