I am another architect, working in UK (Cambridge), predominantly on churches. Our churches of course are speaking all the time, but congregations tend to be deaf to this – and the message is often at odds with the theological aspiration. Which the wider culture reads as dissonance, which is unsettling and hugely off-putting. Time and again the interventions we make in existing churches are about giving the building a new face, and thus a new voice, and lowering the threshold – both physical and figurative.

Great material – thank you.

I especially loved your vision for a church structure that would move congregants through the creation-fall-redemption narrative. Brilliant!

There is the view that the church building should be highly esteemed and appropriately revered as God’s house. Our earthly representation of heaven as we take part in our various forms of liturgy. There is the view that the church building is nothing more than a “sheep shack”. That because WE are the Church, the box that we meet in is insignificant beyond the function of providing a place to meet.

I hope that somewhere in the middle a view can be held that church architecture is important, worth thinking thoughtfully about and seen as an opportunity to have Christ be glorified, while at the same time not being too building focused that we lose sight of the fact that the Church worships within the building but the building is not the Church.

Your comment on “artificially giving a sense of nature” has me hearing Radiohead’s “Fake Plastic Trees” in my head (great song). I’ve seen one too many of those on sanctuary stages. I’ve always wanted to build on that idea of creation in architecture and expand it to depict the entire biblical narrative (see “The Drama of Scripture: Finding Our Place in the Biblical Story” by Goheen). How cool would it be to have your worship experience on a Sunday take you through Creation (an entry that has an organic, indoor/outdoor feel), Sin (a transitional space involving dimmed light, descent), Christ (a meeting space designed around the presentation of the Gospel and Communion) Church (an exit sequence that fosters a unity of the believers in Christ) and New Creation (maybe an indoor or outdoor gathering area that has a “newness” or New Jeruselam/Return to Eden feel to it).

I think there is so much opportunity for a church structure to present the Gospel message of Christ. I hope that whenever a congregation has the opportunity to construct or rennovate a facility the question is raised of what the building communicates about us, and more importantly about Christ.

Considering many Protestant churches of the Reformed and Free Church bent haven’t typically thought sacramentally about church life (or architecture) the discussion in general is a foreign one, or at least one not regularly had. Still, even without a more sacramental view of ecclesiology it seems to me that there needs to be a greater intentionality among church leaders regarding the theological implications of church structures, the “spaces” they form, and the messages they communicate both to the faith community and the wider culture.

Also, I visited your site and would have to say that my list for Eerdmans and Baker would have be very similar to yours. I lived in GR for years and miss it!

Cheers.

It’s hard to do this without sounding snobby, but perhaps when people start hearing the word ‘chancel’ (or other words that may fit one’s local architecture) it will dawn on them that it’s probably not an area to let the kids run around in after the service!

End the end, I suspect, it’s liturgical and sacramental considerations that govern a church building and it’s architecture.