Christchurch prays for quake victims

Christchurch (AP):

Parishioners came together yesterday in parks and on the lawns of churches broken in New Zealand's earth-quake to pray for the dead and missing. They sought togetherness and an answer to the question on everyone's mind: Why?

"The randomness of the events throws up the 'why' question more starkly," the Reverend Mark Chamberlain told about 100 people who came to hear his sermon outside St Barnabas Anglican Church, where jagged cracks line the walls, stained glass windows are shattered and the tower is sinking.

"Why did one person survive and one person die? Why did the people in the cathedral, of all places, perish?"

Up to 22 people may be buried in rubble at the Christchurch Cathedral, most of them believed to be tourists climbing the bell tower for its panoramic views of the southern New Zealand city of Christchurch when it was struck by last Tuesday's 6.3-magnitude earthquake.

Death toll rises

The official death toll climbed yesterday to 147 as search teams uncovered more bodies in the debris and that number was expected to rise, police Superintendent Dave Cliff said. Prime Minister John Key has said the quake, which decimated the city's downtown, may be the country's "single-most tragic" disaster.

The churches that dot the city felt some of the worst of the temblor's wrath. Spires toppled, stained glass windows exploded, walls cracked, and masonry fell.