The St. Barnabas' Anglican Cathedral, Honiara is one of three Anglican cathedrals built in the

Solomon Islands Solomon Islands is an island country consisting of six major islands and over 900 smaller islands in Oceania, to the east of Papua New Guinea and north-west of Vanuatu. It has a land area of , and a population of approx. 700,000. Its capit ...

. The St. Luke's Cathedral was the first to be built in 1920s at

Siota Siota is a region on the north side of Nggela Island at the western end of Utuhu Passage in the Central Province of Solomon Islands, a state in the southwest Pacific Ocean The Pacific Ocean is the largest and deepest of Earth's five oc ...

Nggela The Nggela Islands, also known as the Florida Islands, are a small island group in the Central Province of Solomon Islands, a sovereign state (since 1978) in the southwest Pacific Ocean. The chain is composed of four larger islands and about ...

but it was destroyed in

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposing ...

. The second was the All Saints Cathedral, a temporary structure built in the 1950s which was replaced by the St. Barnabas' Anglican Cathedral, Honiara, named after the St. Barnabas' Chapel and School on Norfolk Island, in the 1960s; the planning to build it started in 1961. The foundation stone for the new cathedral was laid on 6 January 1968 by Bishop Alfred Hill. A dedication service was held on 15 December 1968 which was attended by 1500 people. The cathedral was formally consecrated on 16 June 1969 when 2000 people attended the ceremony and it was dedicated by Bishops Chisholm and Alufurai.

Features

The cathedral is built to a plan of and is a steel framed structure of modern design. Its roof is made of aluminum sheets. It has a concrete floor and its interior furnishings are traditional Melanesian. It has a seating capacity for 900 people.

Burials

A portion of the grounds was consecrated as a Cathedral

garth Garth may refer to: Places * Garth, Alberta, Canada * Garth, Bridgend, a village in south Wales :* Garth railway station (Bridgend) * Garth, Ceredigion, small village in Wales * Garth, Powys, a village in mid Wales :* Garth railway station (Powy ...

for the burial of those who served the

diocese In church governance, a diocese or bishopric is the ecclesiastical district under the jurisdiction of a bishop. History In the later organization of the Roman Empire, the increasingly subdivided provinces were administratively associa ...

over a long period. The body of the ninth Bishop,

Alfred Thomas Hill Alfred Thomas Hill (2 November 1901 – 27 August 1969) was the fourth Anglican Bishop of Melanesia. He was consecrated on Trinity Sunday 1954 (13 June), by Reginald Owen, Archbishop of New Zealand and Bishop of Wellington, at All ...

was the first to be interred here on 1 September 1969. The cathedral also has a casket which contains the burial mat, baton and chalice of John Patteson, who was the first bishop of Melanesia; he had been killed on Nukapu Island in the

Reef Islands The Reef Islands are a loose collection of 16 islands in the northwestern part of the Solomon Islands province of Temotu. These islands have historically also been known by the names of Swallow Islands and Matema Islands. Geography The islan ...

in 1871.

References

{{Honiara St Bar Cathedrals in the Solomon Islands