A Sight to See

Saturday I was able to travel to Helena with a bunch of family to compete in the annual Govenor's Cup races. I really love the architecture of our capitol's downtown area. While I was walking back to the car at one point I had to pass the huge Catholic cathedral downtown and I mentioned to my dad that it would be nice if my church in Bozeman could build a church building like that. There is a beauty and superiority to the building that immediately demands your respect. I thought to myself, "I bet it would be hard to sing praise songs in a church like that." At the same time though, it was the type of building you really wanted to go inside, just to see what magnificent things might lie within its doors. I think it's funny that one of the main reasons I hear argued against building churches like this today is that they make people feel small and insignificant and that makes it hard to worship and attract people. Heaven forbid we should ever feel small and insignificant before our Lord and God. Maybe a building like this only makes it harder to worship ourselves. I also feel that that the "attraction" part of the argument is weak too. From the moment I saw this cathedral I was attracted to it. I think back to C.S. Lewis' "The Magician's Nephew" and I remember the excitement and attraction Digory had upon venturing into the great hall of the white witch; and it was a place of death and darkness. There is something inside us that pulls us to things that are bigger, grander, and holier than ourselves. It can be scary, but that never really seems to be something that stops us in the end; and I think fear is probably an appropriate reaction.
I think Winston Churchill was on to something when he said, "We shape our buildings, and then our buildings shape us."