Coventry Cathedral: a 'symbol of hope'. Photograph: Sam Stephenson (stf)/newsteam.co.uk

Coventry Cathedral featured twice in your columns last week (Andrew Brown, Profile of Justin Welby, 18 April; Simon Jenkins, Save Syria's bombed buildings, 17 April). Andrew Brown notes Archbishop Welby's recognition of the power of the place in transforming conflict and restoring lives. Simon Jenkins compares the cathedral to the rebuiltFrauenkirche in Dresden, suggesting the latter offers a continuation of memory, while Coventry "fetishises ruins".

In Coventry, we have close relationships with our friends in the Frauenkirche and we believe that each of us has given memory life and purpose – our unity in this cause of peace and reconciliation is symbolised by the Coventry Cross of Nails in central position on the altar of the restored church in Dresden. The ruins in Coventry are an integral part of the new cathedral, "ruined and rebuilt", a space which invites and enables honest reflection on the human experience of destruction and brokenness, in the context of hope and a refusal to point the finger of blame.

The remaining walls of the cathedral are being carefully preserved and protected, and at the moment sport extensive scaffolding along their north perimeter. A young Coventrian passed them with her grandmother and was appalled, thinking we were restoring the old building: "Granny, if they repair it, how will we remember?" And as a German visitor observed in the same week, "without remembering we have no hope". Far from "merely leaving the gutted remains" of the old cathedral, their incorporation into the new offers a narrative of hope and reconciliation which depends on their continued preservation, and whose power has a deep and transforming effect on those who visit.
Very Rev John Witcombe
Dean of Coventry

Growing up in Coventry, it was inspirational to see the tireless work for international reconciliation that went on from the ruins of the cathedral as Basil Spence's magnificent new building rose alongside. Anyone who has stood at the great glass screen of the new building and looked out towards the ruins will know what a moving statement it makes.

Sharon Hancock
Leamington Spa, Warwickshire

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