The 7 most beautiful religious buildings in the world right now

[rug]

Ribbon Chapel by Hiroshi Nakamura & NAP Co. Ltd. (Hiroshima, Japan)

Talia Avakian
6h

Every year, the World Architecture Festival creates a shortlist of the most awe-striking buildings on the planet.

From that list, the "building of the year" is determined.

The 2015 festival features 338 finalists, but we're looking at the seven in the religious category, which is especially noteworthy since last year's big award went to a simple community chapel.

The festival and awards announcement will take place in November at the luxurious Marina Bay Sands hotel in Singapore.



Cardedeu by EMC Arquitectura (Lago de Coatepeque, El Salvador)

http://www.businessinsider.com/the-most-beautiful-religious-buildings-in-the-world-right-now-2015-8

[Agschmid]

1. Very cool!

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

2. Some very interesting and striking architecture

but I'm kind of partial to the old ones:


King's College Chapel, Cambridge, UK (1446-1550)


Notre Dame Cathedral, Paris (completed 1345)


Sagrada Familia, Barcelona, Spain (not as old, but absolutely unique; construction started 1882, still unfinished)

[rug]

3. I know what you mean.

Growing up, I was an altar boy here:



St. Vincent Ferrer Church, Manhattan.

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

4. Nice! I was married in this one:

St. Mark's Cathedral, Minneapolis

[rug]

5. What unusual colors.

A gorgeous place for a wedding.

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

6. It isn't really so purple, but it's a beautiful building.

Acoustics are spectacular for musical performances, too.

[DesertFlower]

7. awesome. i was raised catholic

and our church was beautiful. amazing stained glass. i don't think they build them like that anymore.

[Dorian Gray]

9. That's

where I was married! (St. Vincent Ferrer!) Love that church.

[rug]

11. What year if I may ask?

As altar boys we used to serve at weddings. The front steps were some kind of stone that was rough cut. We had to sweep up the rice after the wedding and the rice would get stuck in the recesses of the steps. The weddings were festive and solemn but there was a lot of muttering from us afterwards.

[gopiscrap]

25. we were just at all three of them

went to Mass in Notre Dame

[Jim__]

8. Beautiful buildings.

It would be interesting to know how they relate to the religion and the local culture.

[Leontius]

10. If I had a vote it would be for EMC Arquitectura

Amazingly simple and enchanting creation.

[awoke_in_2003]

13. That was my favorite too. nt

[awoke_in_2003]

12. Not a religious person...

but if I had to go to church I would love that one in Lago de Coatepeque, El Salvador.

[longship]

14. I am an atheist pillar biter.

I love Gothic architecture. My favorite, since I've never traveled in Europe, is St. John the Divine in New York City.


I spent some time in New York in the 70's. One of my favorite things was to take in Sunday afternoons at St. John's when the organist would practice. To sit in that empty cathedral while JS Bach and Cesar Frank was belted out, kicking the dust out of the organ pipes, is an astounding experience, for both believers and non-believers.

So! Yup! I like churches. Like Philip Larkin (also an atheist) wrote in "Church Going", there is something about this stuff. There is something about sitting amongst the empty pews. The organ music just adds to the atmosphere.

Church Going by Philip Larkin

Once I am sure there's nothing going on
I step inside,letting the door thud shut.
Another church: matting, seats, and stone,
And little books; sprawlings of flowers, cut
For Sunday, brownish now; some brass and stuff
Up at the holy end; the small neat organ;
And a tense, musty, unignorable silence,
Brewed God knows how long.
Hatless, I take off
My cycle-clips in awkward reverence,

Move forward, run my hand around the font.
From where I stand, the roof looks almost new––
Cleaned or restored? Someone would know: I don't.
Mounting the lectern, I peruse a few Hectoring large-scale verses, and pronounce 'Here endeth' much more loudly than I'd meant. The echoes snigger briefly. Back at the door I sign the book, donate an Irish sixpence, Reflect the place was not worth stopping for.

Yet stop I did: in fact I often do, And always end much at a loss like this, Wondering what to look for; wondering, too, When churches fall completely out of use What we shall turn them into, if we shall keep A few cathedrals chronically on show, Their parchment, plate, and pyx in locked cases, And let the rest rent-free to rain and sheep. Shall we avoid them as unlucky places?

Or, after dark, will dubious women come To make their children touch a particular stone; Pick simples for a cancer; or on some Advised night see walking a dead one? Power of some sort or other will go on In games, in riddles, seemingly at random; But superstition, like belief, must die, And what remains when disbelief has gone? Grass, weedy pavement, brambles, buttress, sky,

A shape less recognizable each week, A purpose more obscure. I wonder who Will be the last, the very last, to seek This place for what it was; one of the crew That tap and jot and know what rood-lofts were? Some ruin-bibber, randy for antique, Or Christmas-addict, counting on a whiff Of gown-and-bands and organ-pipes and myrrh? Or will he be my representative,
Bored, uninformed, knowing the ghostly silt Dispersed, yet tending to this cross of ground Through suburb scrub because it held unspilt So long and equably what since is found Only in separation - marriage, and birth, And death, and thoughts of these - for whom was built This special shell? For, though I've no idea What this accoutred frowsty barn is worth, It pleases me to stand in silence here;
A serious house on serious earth it is, In whose blent air all our compulsions meet, Are recognised, and robed as destinies. And that much never can be obsolete, Since someone will forever be surprising A hunger in himself to be more serious, And gravitating with it to this ground, Which, he once heard, was proper to grow wise in, If only that so many dead lie round.

Sorry about the formatting. This poem is rarely formatted correctly online. For my dear friend Pinto, now sadly passed, I formatted it correctly as best I could. here. Forgive me if I do not do so now. It nevertheless expresses my feelings, even as a lifelong atheist.

My regards to all.

[rug]

15. The Cathedral there set up a mason's apprentice program some decades ago.

There weren't enough people who knew stone craft and there's probably another century of construction left. They were recruiting apprentices from their neighbors in Harlem.

http://www.nytimes.com/2001/02/23/nyregion/memories-chiseled-in-a-cathedral-s-stone.html

[longship]

16. They were recruited from Harlem.

When I visited there in the early 70's, the Dean of the cathedral stopped construction. Later that decade, the new dean, with Harlem across Morningside Park, saw a new way and construction resumed.

It remains an astounding building, no matter what ones beliefs. And the organ music is astounding, especially during practice.

[rug]

17. Agreed.

[kwassa]

18. Sainte-Chapelle in Paris

I found it quite amazing. Consecrated on April 26, 1248. Only 767 years old.

[47of74]

19. Very nice. Of course there's something to be said for the old ones too

Been there 3 times. The last time I was there in 2014 I had converted to the Episcopal church. Still I did as Rick Steeves suggested and checked the Protestant sword at the hotel. It is really awe inspiring.

[mackerel]

20. I like 6 out of the 7. Didn't care too much for the Catholic one.

[rug]

21. Must be the one in Singapore. It looks like an office building.

My favorite is the Pagoda in Vietnam.

[mackerel]

22. Yeah the one that looked like an office building. I work 50 hours ago

isn't that worship enough!?! LOL

That Church in El Salvador, now that is what spirituality is all about, right there on the water.

[rug]

23. That song is a good mesh.

[zentrum]

24. Corporate, Bank-like and

….cold, except for the simple beauty in the forest. They don't inspire serenity or contemplation in me—but rather alienation.

[MADem]

26. This one is the largest of its type....

[procon]

27. I see millions spent in ostentatious displays of wealth and power

that should have been used to help uplift people and better their lives. These architectural monuments celebrate the fabulous riches of the religion industry with little evidence of piety or self-sacrificing humility taught by the divine beings they claim to represent.