YORK Minster authorities have not wasted any time. Only weeks after introducing the hotly disputed entrance charge, they have embarked on a cut-price promotion with a supermarket.

This is a cheap deal in every sense. Shoppers spending more than £30 at Morrison's qualify for buy one, get one free admission to the Minster. Canny Yorkshire folk may consider this a bargain, unless they are aware that they could have enjoyed a free visit before August.

Nevertheless, to equate a tour around one of the world's greatest Christian cathedrals with your weekly purchase of soap powder and baked beans is hardly edifying.

The error of judgement is compounded by its crass timing. Anger about the decision to charge an entrance fee has barely abated. This remains an open wound in both the Church and wider community.

Strength of feeling was indicated by the Synod of the Diocese of York vote against admission charges in May: 65 to two said the policy should be reversed.

It wasn't: the economic argument for visitor payments was considered irresistible. The Minster had run up a £600,000 deficit. Some will argue that better and earlier financial intervention might have prevented the cathedral going so far into the red, but that is now history.

The Dean and Chapter had to do something. Reluctantly the Archbishop of York, Dr David Hope, agreed there was little alternative to charges, although he has expressed a widespread belief that this should be a temporary solution.

However, if entrance fees could not have been avoided, tacky supermarket tie-ins could and should have been. This is not the way to market the Minster. More respectful fundraising methods to maintain its gothic majesty must be found.

Updated: 11:15 Friday, October 03, 2003