BY ANY STANDARDS, the consecration last Sunday of Dresden's Lutheran cathedral, the Frauenkirche - the Church of our Lady - was a momentous national and international event. It captured people's imagination in a way that compares with the consecration of Basil Spence's new Coventry Cathedral in the presence of the Queen nearly half a century ago.
 
But even that comparison does not do justice to this event. Imagine that Hitler's Luftwaffe had reduced St Paul's Cathedral to a heap of rubble, and that two generations later Christopher Wren's masterpiece had risen again in its former glory, with the City of London's historic skyline restored. That would explain the euphoria of the vast crowds that turned the event into a great folk festival. The people were in the main not those who go to church; yet for the people of Saxony and far beyond, they claimed it as theirs.
 
The reconstruction, down to the last artistic detail, of what is generally held to be the finest Baroque building in Northern Europe was hailed as a miracle on the front pages of almost every German newspaper.
 
For the master builder Eberhard Burger and his team of engineers, craftsmen and artists, it was a labour of love. They had calculated it would take them 12 years. They did it in 11. Last year, the Frauenkirche was topped out with a golden cross and orb, made in London by a silversmith whose father had bombed Dresden. It was paid for by the British people, a gesture both of regret and of reconciliation.
 
As an expression of gratitude to Britain, the Prime Minister of the state of Saxony presented the Duke of Kent, President of the British Dresden Trust, with the state's Order of Merit.
 
Children headed the consecration procession, carrying the pulpit Bible and the eucharistic vessels, central to the Lutheran tradition, and also the altar cross, the only object that did not replicate an 18th-century original. It was Coventry Cathedral's Cross of Nails, symbolising the international ministry of reconciliation that the Frauenkirche now shares with Coventry as a member of the worldwide network of peace centres, the Community of the Cross of Nails.
 
After the liturgical act of consecration, during which the Bishop of Coventry, the Rt Revd Colin Bennetts, read at the font the Gospel passage commanding the Church to baptise all nations, Germany's President underlined that this was more than a German event. A stir went through the congregation when he concluded by saying that he had received a personal letter of good wishes from Queen Elizabeth II.
 
Predictably, what made the consecration memorable was not the liturgy, nor even the preaching, but the glorious Baroque music sung by Dresden's celebrated choirs. The cathedral's accoustics (unlike those in so many famous churches) were magical - as was the whole day. Lit by brilliant sunshine, everything was relayed on huge screens to at least 60,000 people around the church.
 
Yet it would be wrong to say that everyone was happy. The ruined cathedral, left behind by the devastating British raid that killed at least 25,000 people, had become a treasured memorial, an icon expressing the pity of war, venerated by brave groups through the long years of Communist rule - dissidents coming to the ruin with candles to demonstrate for peace and human rights in the midst of the Cold War.
 
They, and initially the church leaders, wished to preserve the ruin, as has been done in Coventry. Public opinion prevailed, but not without pain for many.
 
There were defects on the day. The unresolved rivalry between German Protestantism and Roman Catholicism was still in the air. The kings of Saxony were also kings of Poland, and hence Roman Catholic. The 18th-century burghers were nearly all Lutherans, and built this great cathedral to put the Court Church, today's Roman Catholic Cathedral, in its shade. Only 300 metres separates the two cathedrals.
 
At the consecration, Germany's political leaders were formally welcomed. The chairman of the Catholic Bishops' Conference, Cardinal Lehman, and the Papal Nuncio (a colourful presence) were not; nor was the RC half of German Christians watching on television. Nor was any attempt made to get across lovingly to the great unchurched majority of East German people. This was a missed opportunity.
 
In the evening, no longer in the media limelight, the church was once again overfilled for its first ecumenical service. Most moving was a psalm, sung in Hebrew by Saxony's Chief Rabbi. That, and only that, brought tears to many eyes.
 
Bishop Bennetts, preaching in flawless German, told the story of Liverpool 's two bishops, who prayed, planned, and ate together every week, and transformed the religious climate of the city from bitterness to friendship. "A model for Dresden?" he asked.
 
Spontaneously, the Roman Catholic Bishop of Dresden was then asked to speak by Stephan Fritz, the Frauenkirche's pastor. That was not in the plan. The Bishop's charisma  produced the day' s only applause from an otherwise restrained public.
 
A meeting was convened on Sunday evening, with three English bishops present, to explore whether there might be an Anglican presence on the Frauenkirche's staff. Pastor Fritz said that his church's task would not be to serve its own congregation. It would not be one more parish primarily concerned with its own life and growth, but a house of God, open to all without exception, from every Church and of none. Good news for Dresden and far beyond.
The Revd Paul Oestreicher is a Canon Emeritus of Coventry Cathedral.