Sacred Space 1
Temple or Meetinghouse? I’m thinking about space. Not really about “outer-space” with starships, x-wing fighters and all that (though sometimes my family and friends think I‘m a bit spacey), but worship space. As our congregation begins to plan and plot how to remodel and renovate our worship area (Nave and Sanctuary for you liturgy-Nazis), I am going to think out-loud here a bit. It seems to me that there are two major extremes with regard to worship space. On the one hand, there are those with a heavy sacerdotal bent who look on the worship area as something like the divinely instituted Temple. That’s tempting mainly because of the depth of reverence and awe that such a thing evokes. I once visited a Serbian Orthodox Church years ago. As I went through the doors I still remember being struck by a heart-pounding anticipation that came on me all of a suddenly, that I was entering into the august presence of God. There was something about the “otherness” of the Nave, the iconostasis...