How The Architectural Setting For Worship Forms Our Faith

Every liturgical space reflects the theological commitments of its designers. Every time a liturgical space is used, those ideals shape the experience of those who worship within it. Space for worship must be designed with concern for the theological and liturgical commitments of a given worshiping community.

In the valley of the Mohawk River in upstate New York stand two churches built just before the Revolutionary War. Both were built by German immigrants, both were built with the same local stone. But there the similarities end. Reformed Christians built the Fort Herkimer Church, while Lutherans erected the Palatine Bridge Church. The buildings show how far apart in faith their builders had grown in the two hundred years since the Reformation. The Fort Herkimer Church is a preaching church par excellence. Every element in the building focuses on the pulpit, standing about twelve feet high with an elegant sounding board over it. No building is a better witness to the sovereign Word of God, which shapes both life and worship. The Lutheran church, by contrast, is a sacrament church, gathered around the Communion rail that encircles both altar-Table and pulpit. God's presence in, with, and under physical objects is proclaimed by this building. One comes away from each building with no doubt about the faith of its builders. The buildings are good examples of the ways in which faith can be expressed in stone and wood, plaster and glass. And each has been making its respective witness for well over two hundred years now. We think of Churchill's famous phrase when the rebuilding of the House of Parliament was undertaken: "We shape our buildings and ever after they shape us." Certainly, these two churches were successful spatial efforts in expressing the faith of the pioneers. In their time, these buildings were not only adequate but were probably more satisfactory than the remodeled medieval buildings their builders had forsaken back home in the Rhine Valley. The new buildings were built with an intentionality to express a contemporary faith, not that of a previous age. Space and Faith as Potential Antagonists The problem for us is whether either of these buildings would be an adequate expression of our faith today. Of course, a building need not be old to be out of touch with our faith. In Burlington, Vermont, two cathedrals stand barely a block apart. Both were built after earlier Gothic-Revival cathedrals had burned down in the 1970s. In architectural style, both are contemporary but the Episcopal cathedral is strangely conservative in that the altar-Table and clergy seats are located in a distinct space, removed as a separate volume from the nave where the people and choir sit. The Roman Catholic cathedral thrusts the altar-Table into the midst of the congregation, and no one sits more than eight seats from it. One cathedral suggests that God is remote and transcendent, the other that God is near and immanent. What if the building does not reflect our faith today? If not, it will fight us, and the chances are that the building will win. I would be reluctant to preach on the priesthood of all Christians at the Episcopal cathedral because the building would shout me down; in the Roman Catholic cathedral I would get a better hearing. Not only does space form faith but it can, and frequently does, deform and distort faith. Thus we are frequently caught in a conflict between the faith that we profess and the faith that the building proclaims. The most ironic sermon I ever heard was Pope Paul VI preaching against triumphalism in the church. But he preached in St. Peter's Basilica, and Michelangelo clearly had the last word. The conflict is not usually that obvious but it happens in many of our churches every Sunday. The more subtle and undramatic it is, the more insidious and dangerous. The conflict between space and faith is not to be taken lightly. Pastors have to develop a new sensitivity in learning to "read" space. We must learn to ask of any church space the same question we ask when making ethical decisions: "What is going on here?" Church architecture is not some innocuous muzak that we can afford to neglect. Rather it is an important constituent in forming the faith of the people who gather within it, perhaps the most important single factor in their formation. Frequently, remodeling or renovating a church is one of the most significant occasions for reshaping the life of a community of faith. Too often, such opportunities become mere occasions for redecorating or accommodating a new organ. Renovations ought to be regarded as a vital change to rethink the mission of the church and to reinforce that mission by giving it physical form. Careful church renovation is not a luxury; it often is a necessity unless we are to continue in self-contradiction. Unless we are indifferent to the contents of the faith we teach, we have to take seriously the architectural setting of our worship. At stake here is the sacramental principle that the outward and visible cannot be dissociated from what is inward and spiritual. Somehow Protestants still have trouble with this; the people who sell automobiles take it for granted. They give us power, glamour, affluence, all made of steel and glass. We are not called to be more spiritual than God. Buildings are faith in just the same sense that a kiss is love. Judas could dissemble, actors can pretend, but buildings are pretty honest statement of faith. In a very real way, space is faith. Seeking Harmony between Space and Faith As we become more sensitive to the relationship of space and faith, there is a certain grammar we learn as we discover what space is saying. We may note here two forms of speech. One, we recognize that every space in churches exists in relationship to other spaces. This forces us to raise questions about people and how they relate to each other, how they relate to the clergy, and how they relate to God. The arrangement of different spaces are primary concerns. What kind of space is provided for people to come together to discern the body of Christ? Are the clergy alone with God in the remote holy space of a chancel? Does the building suggest that God is somewhere out beyond the east window? The arrangement of spaces makes definite statements about such matters. The second thing we have to think through is what it is that people do when they come together. Such activities usually focus on a particular liturgical center, a baptismal font or pool, a pulpit, an altar-Table. Here it is important to be clear about functions. What happens in baptism? Is it simply a sentimental occasion of Christian cuteness, or is it grafting a new branch onto the trunk so that the same energy that vivifies every part of the tree gives life to it, too? Does the whole community participate, or is it a private ceremony? And is it a genuine proclamation of God's will to forgive and cleanse or just a dry cleaning? All these questions and more must be asked about the design of the font and its location. One has to make up one's mind about some important theological issues first. This is why worship reform and architectural renovation have to go hand in hand. You cannot reform the Lord's Supper with the altar-Table nailed to the wall. But a free-standing altar-Table will not be much of an improvement either unless one is deeply aware of what it means to gather a community about the Lord's Table to give thanks. The baptismal fonts we have in many Protestant churches reveal what baptism has meant to us. They are an outward and visible witness that baptism has been a short and insignificant ceremony performed from a bowl tucked out of sight most of the time. In a perverse way, those bowls told just how unimportant baptism was in many of our churches. If we had really believed that baptism is union to Christ and incorporation into the church, we would not have been content with such diminutive fonts to proclaim so great a truth. In the South, Baptists tend to speak of being baptized and being saved as synonymous terms. Their baptismal pools are highly visible and important parts of the building, at least when they are being used. We do better with pulpits, but there are questions to ask here, too. Do we preach "six feet above contradiction" (J. A. T. Robinson), or do we speak on our people's level? Is our preaching biblical, or is the Bible visually (and really) relegated to a separate lectern? How do we bring preacher, Bible, and people together in the most meaningful relationship? Our visible signs tell far more than we want to reveal. Liturgical reform must accompany any meaningful reform of space. One word of caution is necessary. We do not want to tie knots in the future the way many congregations did in the 1950s when they built churches as if nothing in worship would ever change. Now we are more humble; we know that worship does change and so must our space. We shall not always express our faith in the same ways, and so the spaces of those who come after us will be different, just as our faith must be expressed in ways different from those who came before us. We can learn from the past, but we do not wish to impose it on our present or on the future.