Faith & Form
the interfaith forum on religion, art and architecture
Featured Article
Mausoleum as Mnemonic Device
A cemetery does not just contain the remains of the dead. It also aids the memory of those who remain alive; it is a kind of physical mnemonic device that helps us remember those who have passed away, with names and dates carved in headstones or on columbaria walls to trigger our thoughts about those buried there. As time passes and those who knew the deceased also pass away, … [Read More...]
Editorial
House Party
“God's House” and “The House of the Lord” are such commonplace terms for religious buildings that they barely register their implications of intimacy and domes- ticity. Many people raised in mainline religions–Catholic, Protestant, Jewish, or even Islamic–have difficulty likening a place of worship to a home. Our religious buildings are formal, for the most part. One is expected to dress and act differently there than one would at home. God's House can be more … [Read More...]
The Last Word
The Trouble with Those S Words
Several months ago Michael J. Crosbie wrote an editorial in these pages (Vol. 45, No. 1, p. 4) describing his thoughts on a panel discussion that Karla Britton and I had organized, titled “Space, the Sacred and the Imagination.” Crosbie noted the fact that among the panelists several seemed “...uncomfortable with the very word sacred, freighted as it is with requirements of belief....” He also accurately noted that instead of a discussion of the sacred per se, the … [Read More...]
