Mostly, We Build Churches
We engineer awesome bridges to span impassable waterways, blend them with landscapes, and polish them endlessly in the name of celebrating our environment and getting ourselves from one side to the other in the most beautiful manner possible.
We construct government palaces, gilded totems to make the elected officials inside feel comfortable and important while the make the difficult decisions necessary to guide our society. We architect impressive museums where we can celebrate our creativity, ingenuity, audacity, inspiration, and unlikely histories. We erect monuments where we can gather
to marvel at the stories of yesterday's fallen heroes, enigmatic leaders, courageous thinkers, and brave soldiers...and to inspire the next generation. We design elaborate universities, sprawling campuses that invoke learning and foster the quest for knowledge.
But mainly, it seems, we build churches.
In light of everything else we build, it's perfectly in keeping that we put so much effort, so much blood, sweat, and money into impossibly detailed tributes to God. If God is bigger, better, and smarter than us
, as we're so often told, then, well, he deserves all the attention. But what about the part about God preferring humility to ostentation, paupers to princes?
I appreciate beautiful churches -- in the same way that I appreciate Grand Central Terminal or the Golden Gate Bridge.
These cathedrals aren't just striking; they add to the character of their surroundings. Can you imagine Paris without the Notre Dame or Sacre Coeur? Rome without St Peter's or even New York without St Patrick's? Just as the art world would be much poorer if the church hadn't inspired so many incredible artists, so, too, would be the world of architecture.
But I can't honestly believe that these buildings are about God any more than a beautiful bridge is about traffic. Each time I walk into one of these cathedrals, with 20-foot stained glass windows, fancy altars, master statues, and 80-foot ceilings -- but few or no worshippers -- I think, this building needs to be this big. They had to make room for all the irony.
We engineer awesome bridges to span impassable waterways, blend them with landscapes, and polish them endlessly in the name of celebrating our environment and getting ourselves from one side to the other in the most beautiful manner possible.
We construct government palaces, gilded totems to make the elected officials inside feel comfortable and important while the make the difficult decisions necessary to guide our society. We architect impressive museums where we can celebrate our creativity, ingenuity, audacity, inspiration, and unlikely histories. We erect monuments where we can gather
to marvel at the stories of yesterday's fallen heroes, enigmatic leaders, courageous thinkers, and brave soldiers...and to inspire the next generation. We design elaborate universities, sprawling campuses that invoke learning and foster the quest for knowledge.But mainly, it seems, we build churches.
In light of everything else we build, it's perfectly in keeping that we put so much effort, so much blood, sweat, and money into impossibly detailed tributes to God. If God is bigger, better, and smarter than us
, as we're so often told, then, well, he deserves all the attention. But what about the part about God preferring humility to ostentation, paupers to princes?I appreciate beautiful churches -- in the same way that I appreciate Grand Central Terminal or the Golden Gate Bridge.
These cathedrals aren't just striking; they add to the character of their surroundings. Can you imagine Paris without the Notre Dame or Sacre Coeur? Rome without St Peter's or even New York without St Patrick's? Just as the art world would be much poorer if the church hadn't inspired so many incredible artists, so, too, would be the world of architecture.
But I can't honestly believe that these buildings are about God any more than a beautiful bridge is about traffic. Each time I walk into one of these cathedrals, with 20-foot stained glass windows, fancy altars, master statues, and 80-foot ceilings -- but few or no worshippers -- I think, this building needs to be this big. They had to make room for all the irony.
posted by jeffo at 5:19 PM
2 Comments:
Yeah, but... we don't really build churches anymore.
And if you want to see grand cathedrals packed with worshippers, go to Poland. It's kind of scary.
safe to say we have enough. i've heard a bit about the religious revolution happening in poland and the country's attempt to influence the debate over issues like abortion and gay rights -- which is being countered, ironically, by spain. i think there's an interesting story in there to do with the correlation between the age/development/maturity of a society and its religious leanings. i'm sure there are scores of other factors, of course.
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