A church not far from where I live was torn down this week. I have written about the church before. It was part of a Christian movement (not so much a denomination) known as the Plymouth Brethren. The church at which I was pastor for many years had a Plymouth Brethren heritage as well, though it was quite different than the now torn down church that was called “Fourth Street Gospel Hall”.
A friend of mine took a photo from her balcony of the remains of the Fourth Street Gospel Hall building just this morning and seeing it got me thinking back to countless memories of church buildings. Perhaps, it would have been a healthy spiritual practice for those who oversaw the construction of the building years ago to anticipate also its destruction, a kind of memento mori for buildings. The monastics call us to “remember our death” so that we might truly live. If you were regularly involved in a church you may have strong memories of the place. How much of your faith is filtered through these memories in which the building played a key part? Did you go to youth group? Was there a youth lounge or a meeting room in which you attended Sunday School classes or mid-week small groups or Bible studies? I remember staying in a church on a youth group trip once that had a theatre style youth room with couches instead of chairs. There must have been 50 couches in that huge youth group room. Such a weird space.
As a Youth Pastor, and then Sr. Pastor, the church building holds a lot of memories for me at times when it was mostly empty. I remember painting the youth lounge in my church. I remember unlocking the doors or locking up after everyone else had left. I remember feeling hopeful in a space, as a good number of people gathered for an event that would, no doubt, be really good. I also remember being in the basement before very many gatherings and feeling something like depression, sensing that not many people at all would show up, but that it was still on me to make it feel like a great gathering. In those spaces I felt a pressure to keep things going.
The building was the location, over time, of key formation in my life, relationally and spiritually. I am thankful for the church buildings that have been part of my life.
And then they are gone. I assume that at some point in history Fourth Street Gospel Hall was filled with life and activity. It likely had some point in its life when a good number of people gathered there for various events. It would have been built as part of a larger hope to impact the community. Perhaps those who built it referred to the neighbourhood as a “mission field”. Knowing the rather harsh conservatism and rather narrow theology of the Gospel Halls, I think that it is a fair question to ask whether the church there had overall a positive or negative contribution to Christian mission in general. That is, did more people come to an awareness of hopeful Christian faith from the work of Fourth Street or did more people turn away from Christian faith because of Fourth Street. I’m sure there are arguments on either side.
It’s a reminder that our memories of church buildings can be complicated. Some of us can point to fantastic memories, formative occasions and times in our lives and the geography of key and important friendships. Many can also point to the place in which a good deal of damage occurred, where they felt judged and dehumanized, perhaps where they picked up a view of the world that was negative and hurtful and that has been difficult to overcome.
Right now we know this, as so much in the world is changing, the place and nature of church buildings is changing. Very many church buildings are evidently built for a time that no longer exists. Post-pandemic this might be said of some buildings that have even been built recently.
Memory can become prayer. Remembering can be lifted up into prayerful consideration and petition.
Dear God;
I pray for those who remember significant times in church buildings. I pray healing for those wounded. I pray gratitude for those encouraged. Thank you for so much good that has occurred in spaces of meeting and praying. I pray for the ministers and pastors who carry weights of emotion in often empty spaces, hoping for people to show up, wondering about the future. Grant us courage to acknowledge that the places we may have experienced as places of hope may have been places of darkness for some people. At this time help us to be hopeful, even as the need for and nature of church buildings changes. Maybe the building that was so significant for us is now, or will soon be, gone. Let us not insist upon holding on to something simply because it mattered in our lives. Help us to be grateful. Help us also to let go and grant us hope and creativity as we consider what is ahead.
Amen.
Well said. I love the images of church buildings. Any time I see a church on a landscape
I experience a kind of emotion. Something about seeing a cross evokes a kind of reverence because a cross can only evoke hope. I can’t think of any other sign that gives me the same kind of hope. Humanity lives in church….humanity with all its fears and troubles and biases and conflicts. If we no longer have churches where will we go to take ourselves?