Church Architecture — Influence of Church Culture

In our small group meeting, we have discussed “World Views” and how they influence our Christian beliefs such as “Where we came from?” We have discussed Darwin’s biological “Evolution Theory” in the group study. My thinking is that we seem to neglect the “Cultural Evolution” and its influence in our worldviews. History of the past 50 years tells us how different and how fast the landscapes changed since when we were children.

Here is an article from InternetMonk pointed to the Church Cultures as it reflected in the Church Architecture. Then please read also the comments. Their opinions varied all over the places and are worthwhile to read.  Please watch the 8-minutes video from the Covenant Presbyterian Church.

I appreciated my daughter’s choice of the Church for her wedding which is still a beautiful memory, not only for the Gothic style church building. She studies architecture and I can understand her taste. Let us back to the comments of InternetMonk’s article. A lot of our opinions are results of our upbringing. Since childhood, I love beautiful churches and Gothic architectures. After joining evangelical churches, I heard that WORD is more important than WORLD. We gathered and worshiped in small churches and even rented garages. Yes, the brotherly love kept us warm. But, I miss that feeling of “transcend” into God’s place.

Some of this is a result of “CHURCH CULTURAL EVOLUTION” since the 60s which accompanied by the contemporary ROCK BAND worships. Please look at two worship sites, one in a Presbyterian church and one in an Auditorium Stage for comparisons (my blog article on 07/04/2009). The evolution of church worship to ROCK BAND worship style paralleled the culture evolution starting in the 60s’ “youth culture” which transcend social and ideological boundaries in America.

That transcendence was made possible by the huge young demographic. Youthful preferences in fashion, moveis, television programs, poetry, and above all, music became indistinguishable from popular culture as a whole.

(The Age of American Unreason by Susan Jacob)  http://www.susanjacoby.com/

Susan continued on —

“A popular culture driven almost entirely by the preferences of the young – as opposed to one in which generational tastes form a distinctive but not necessarily dominant new strand – discourages the making of important intellectual and aesthetic distinctions and tends to discard the best expression of popular culture from the past.”

Couple days ago, our church pianist Cara came to practice the wedding songs with me. We chatted about the worships. She doesn’t like the ROCK BAND style but she can play the piano in their style when asked. Nevertheless, the playing becomes a torture of her ears.

My thinking is “CHURCH CULTURE” will be like a pendulum. After half a century of contemporary worships, now I heard a lot of dissatisfactions and even criticisms of it (Please read my earlier articles in my blog on worships). InternetMonk just started a series of Blogs on Church Worship. These are worthwhile to read and discuss.

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