There are two churches in Under Smoke City but they go untended. Vicars and rectors wait until hushed Sunday, but not the lonely chaplain in the cathedral to industry, hoping to be the voice of Light in a soot-darkened world. Otherwise empty, the little stone chapel holds his sighs and sermons and intent silence; not since Muna's morning prayer has anyone been. Robert Purefoy–
ROBERT PUREFOY : For your Love, Lord. For you I will endure all–
waits only for the evening and solitude in his own home.
ROBERT PUREFOY : By what golden act,
Oh Lord, my Lord,
did I deserve your love
and guiding hand?
What could I do
that is worth an ounce
your mercy and kindness?
I am not special.
You forgive sinners,
whatever sin,
and mine are no more
or less than others.
What divine wisdom
Oh Lord made you
Choose my broken old heart
To spread the sweet message
Of your loving Grace?
As true as I stand here
Oh Lord of Love
Oh Master of the World
Oh God of Light
The source of Peace
Amid the noise and haste,
You give no-one more
Than they can bear
When they pray for your Grace.
What service can I
A frail human heart
A temporary part
In your overall design
Oh Lord and master
My God and my Saviour
What service can I offer
When you are so much
More than I am?
I'll do what I can.
I'll sit with passing strangers
And listen when
They unload their troubles.
Bring Light, bring Love,
Bring them Peace for a span.
I pray Lord,
You bolster my failing
Heart and weeping faith.
Let them all come.
Remember them.
They are forgetting.
The Saviour who gave his life
Has gone from their minds.
Remember them.
They have forgotten you.
But when they go into the darkness you will still be with them all.
Let me show them how your Light may guide them.
MUNA LUT : Oh,
says Muna Lut as she passes by the closed doors of the station chapel,
he must be so lonely.
She whispers her own prayer,
MUNA LUT : Give him a life,
and hurries on as her words float up into the soaring golden roof-ribs.
OLD BENJAMIN : There is no greater life than this,
says Old Ben. He watches the prayers wink and shine.
OLD BENJAMIN : This is the soul of our city,
the man says; and he winks back at the words. He watches them glowing still through the heavy processional smoke of his cathedral's censers.
Let the mighty engines carry the message around the world,
he adds to the constellation.