Mark C. N. Sullivan of Irish Elk comments on the lastest Vosko
deconstruction in what is suppose to be renovation of the Cathedral in Rochester, NY.
When he said that the diocese encourages visitors to go on a "Holiness Hunt" in the renovated cathedral I thought that might be a just.
Unfortunately that is the term they use.
Though I think it is the perfect definition for what many have to go through to find the Tabernacle. The level of difficulty in playing Where’s Jesus makes Where’s Waldo simple simple by comparison. Mark links to various picture and articles about the Cathedral’s renovation (which was fought for years by a group of parishioners) including this picture of a comparison old and new.
All I know is that if I walked into this Cathedral after not being there for a couple of years I would immediately call the police certain that thieves had ransacked it and carried away almost all the sacred items. Or possibly request "Beam it back down Scotty!" Speaking of Star Trek, maybe I am too much of a SF geek, but I find the new Bishop’s chair to strike an amazing resemblance to Captains Kirk’s chair.
As with many restorations the Tabernacle has been removed to a side chapel though at least they had managed to rescue a beautiful Tabernacle from a church that had burned down.
The voiceover on this page concerning the box altar said that the Church mandates that the altar with the presider be brought admist the people in this case into the center of the church. This is normally what annoys me the most is that they say that the Church has mandated or called for this type of change. I attended a Mass at one church just before they were to move into their new church. I remember being pretty steamed when the priest said that the Vatican had instructed that they had to move the Tabernacle from the center. Maybe that priest really believed this to be true, but it would have been nice if they had actually looked at the relevant documents before making the decision and passing out mistaken information. He also stated that many had complained about the change, but that there was nothing they could do about it. This was the same church (that I no longer go to) that has 2000 C.E in large letters displayed on their school. Using Common Era on a Catholic School is just one of the silliest things I have seen.
The Eastern Catholic Churches went though an iconoclastic period and corrected it with even more beautiful churches. Mark also linked to an Easter Orthodox Church in the same area. I can only hope that we in the West we make up for our own stark iconoclastic architecture.
My own parish was also recently restored. The difference, as you can see below, is that we didn’t have a beauty-hating architect do it.
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My parish was “renovated” in 1969, which means, modernized and pratically destroyed. Parts of it, such as the main altar, were literally destroyed.
Luckily, it was re-restored back to its original neo-Gothic greatness 5 years ago. There are some pictures of it online:
http://www.portlandcathedral.org/
Check the “history” section for details. Just so you know, there is hope that some of these awful “renovations” can be undone!
I really don’t know what is in the minds of some of these “renovators”. Beautiful churches are not only more conducive to the faithful’s worship, they provide a form of witness to non-believers. Many people have been attracted to the Church first because of the beauty of its churches. Beauty serves Truth. I think it’s safe to say no convert has ever said, “You know, I would never have considered joining the Church, but when I saw how ugly some of their modern churches are, I knew they must be on to something.”
And when the renovators’ zeal for uglification leads them to shunt the tabernacles off to the side somewhere, as if there’s nothing important there, then it’s no longer physical ugliness we have to worry about, but spiritual corruption.
For anyone who hasn’t read it, I heartily recommend Ugly as Sin, by Michael S. Rose. I read it before I ever became Catholic, and it helped me in my understanding of the faith, not just buildings.
The bishop’s chair at the cathedral in Spokane, WA looks even more like Captain Kirk’s chair–but it’s white with yellow velvet upholstry.
I clicked on your comparison picture of new and old.
Two notations: the old was beautiful and packed with people, the new was empty, sterile…
…and WHAT is Jesus doing on that cross beam?! It looks like He’s in the Olympic gymnastic tryouts!!
Thanks for the link, Jeff. That chair has me looking for the accompanying retro Danish modern floor lamp. Meantime, Michael Rose could cite as Exhibit A the diocesan talking-points on the mandated nave altar: the ugly and disaffecting imposed in the name of being more engaging.
Jeff, while the picture of your church is lovely, are you sure it’s “catholic”. Afterall, where are the banners? What’s with the stained glass? where’s the disco ball?
yuk
For a really neat chair, checkout my parish! This renovation was done just before I arrived. (The dedication took place one week before my assignment began!)
http://www.ctkkcmo.org/dedication%20june%2022%202004.html
You cannot really see the chair (except when someone is sitting in it.) but the altar tne d the ambo should give you some idea – the chair is the same shape and style as the altar and ambo! Very sci-fi. They took a modern church (dedicated 1954) and post-modernized it! I have my troubles with it, and I would have done it differently, but it could also be a lot worse!
I would like to confront one like Vosco and ask them to show me where the Church mandated these things? The only think I can think of on the altar is something along the lines of: In the construction of future churches (not: Go out and change this right away) a freestanding altar should be constructed so that the priest may incense around it (how many of these parishes us incense at all?) and that Mass *may* be celebrated facing the people. I never read any authoritative document which suggested that the altar be removed to the center of the church for a “more intimate setting.” It is maddening the way these people carry on in the spirit of Vatican II.
Our parish is at the end of a capital campaign to raise money for a new church. It will be the traditional cruciform design with the tabernacle front and center with a huge dome over it. Praise God our focus will be on Jesus and not each other!! Please pray that the $6 million needed ( includes offices, perpetual adoration chapel and gathering room) will be raised. God bless you. Don’t loose hope! Peggy
The good thing about all those ugly bare walls is that future Catholics will be able to fresco the heck out of ’em.
No Maureen – Banners! we need more Banners!
I think it was Fr. Corapi who responded to a non-catholic who complained that all Catholics worship statues. He said “no we don’t, we now worship banners” or somthing to that effect.
Can you tell that I grew up in a 70’s banner church.
Does anyone want to see an awesome neogothic cruciform church dedicated in 2003? One of the Anglican Use (those Anglican parishes who have come back to the Church wholesale) parishes in Houston has built this beautiful and Sacred House of God and Gate of Heaven! Don’t let anyone ever tell you that they could not build a church like this today – this parish has proved it can be done!
http://www.walsingham-church.org/photos.htm
How horribly sad. You might as well have gone in there with a butcher knife and done a better job. It looks like a Methodist Church now. If someone had wanted a modern church, why didn’t they just build one. To desecrate that beautiful church like that was a sin.
Umm, Fr. Totton? How do I say this charitably? Your church looks like a trade labor high school! And I know your chair couldn’t actually have a gigantic crack down the middle of it, but it sure looks like it… “Woa-a-ah, I’m falling in!!”
I think your time in Purgatory has been lessened.
An architect friend of mine tells the story of working with a pastor who wanted a Trekesque panel on the arm of the chair for the new church. It was to be wired to an indicator on the ambo. It would have let him tell the reader to speed up or slow down.
Fr. Richtsteig, I’m getting the funny visual of liturgist electro-shock treatment! Maybe having the organist just start tinkling the keys like on the Letterman or Leno like they do for a commercial break.
Beautiful picture. Thanks for sharing.
Teresa, You pense: “How to say it charitably?” I don’t think I could have said it better myself! Fortunately, I have been reassigned to a country parish with a 100 year old church which has not been completely reckovated – it is easily salvagable!
Incidentally, the crack (present on chair, altar and ambo) is an effect of using two completely different types of wood (of contrasting shade!) Had I done it, we would have used stone (preferably marble) for the altar and wood for the other two pieces. For that matter, the sanctuary would be in its proper place and it wouldn’t be shaped like an easter egg! the chair would back up to the wall (not behind the altar – that is where the Blessed Sacrament would be reserved!) but next to the side wall ala the sedilla of old! I won’t go on about it, as I said, I am moving soon. Please know that I enjoyed your response!
Furthermore, I do like the electroshock idea (to keep the organist from tinkling when he/she is not supposed to! Fortunatley our accompanist (at least when it is the director of music) has stopped tinkling when I say Mass!
I attend Gonzaga University (Go Bulldogs!) In my freshman year we got a tour of campus by the campus architect. One of the highlights of the tour was the student chapel on the third floor of the Administration building. The chapel is beautiful: all the richness and splendour that is so conducive to prayer. After showing the chapel to us, the architect showed us pictures of what the chapel had looked like only a few years earlier. He said the chapel had originally looked very close to what it looks like now, but than “Vatican II came along, and so out with the old, in with the new.” The new consisted of an orange ceiling, fuchsia carpeting, pastel squares for stained glass windows, and folding chairs (the pews were literally pushed out of the thid story window). The architect is a pretty cool guy: I don’t think he’s Catholic, but he appreciates the old Catholic architecture. He spoke glowingly of the old contruction commissioned by the Jesuits in the 1800s, and he shook his head when he talked about the Vatican II changes. Anyway, he was commissioned to restore the chapel, and of course, the first thing an architect does is ask to see the money. They gave him $600,000! He was shocked, and asked what exactly they wanted him to do to the chapel with all that money. They told him to restore its soul. So he found some old pictures of it before the changes and matched them as best he could. It really looks beautiful inside now. Apparently other think so too: in the five years before the restoration there was one wedding in that chapel; in the one year after it there were eight! I hope more people realize soon that that kind of beauty and solemnity is a great aid in focusing the mind on higher things, and so is a great help in praying. May all out churches one day follow suite.
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