We are the ornamentation. . .

In a variety of columns I have lamented what church architecture has become.  In America it is the adoption of the warehouse as the form and shape of God's House.  In Europe it is the sterile and empty walls of designs that could be grand.  In both cases, the ornamentation of the House of God has become the people assembled.  The space itself is devoid of art -- even modern!  Instead the walls are blank.  In America the color is black so that the modern industrial look is front and center.  In Europe it is the whitewashed walls that provide the canvas for people to be the art.  In both cases, we have become adornment of God's house.

Some might insist that it is no different to offer God what we make than to offer Him ourselves as the beauty of His house.  That is not quite the same for the beauty formed with hands has always been a representation of His own Word and the focus has been on what He has done.  The art of the centuries which was both fostered by the Church and passed down through the ages within the structures of God's House was in a profound sense the offering back to God of what He has said and done.  While there is glory in the creator's art and craft, the message of the art (paint, stone, wood, and fabric) is not about us but about what He has done in Christ.  The artist is sometimes remembered but the knowledge of the artist is not required to know what is being said on canvas, in sculpture, in carving, and in weaving.  Now, however, the medium is missing so that only the artist remains.  We are God's art -- at least in modern form and meaning.

In Germany some 40 million euros were spent showcasing not art but the people of God.  Replacing a round cathedral dedicated in 1773, the new St. Hedwig Cathedral of Berlin spares no expense except on art.  Its round shape reflects the former structure bombed in World War II and rebuilt in stark and ugly style contrasting with its more classical form on the exterior.  1963 meet 2024.  It is hard to see how the hole in the floor in the 1963 rebuild could be much stranger but now there is a building with literally nothing except the people to adorn its plain walls.  Of course, you could ask why bother to build a new cathedral (it would be hard to call it a renovation) for a declining church body except that where the German churches lack people, they have deep pockets.  Perhaps the decline will catch up with the church tax but until that happens the Berliners could afford a structure which says more about them than it does about God.  Watch the video below to see what I mean.   

By contrast, the Evangelical Cathedral has wisely chosen simply to preserve the structure and its art from the 1700s.  While it is not immune from the rot of decline that has affected most of Europe, somebody decided that the building was a work of art to be faithfully preserved for its cultural heritage and so it escaped much of what the Roman Catholic cathedral now lauds.  That said, preserving a building while abandoning its Gospel is not necessarily something to be praised either.