You have probably encountered a building that commanded your attention and, perhaps, took your breath away. It might have been a church, a public civic building such as a courthouse, a capitol building, or a library, or even a private home, whether one that is currently lived in or one that can now be visited as a historical site. Such buildings are impressive, beautiful, and have a presence that simply cannot be ignored. Everything about them fits together and belongs. To move or rearrange any of their significant elements would not be right. To do so would somehow throw off the balance, proportion, and harmony. You might say that it would “harm” or do violence to these buildings in some way and make them a different thing. This would be tantamount to making “edits” to Michelangelo’s Pietà or to a work of Mozart. They would no longer be the same work of art. And it is hard to imagine them being anything but diminished—less than what they were created to be.

We might say that buildings such as these are not just there; they are there. They possess a power, a force even. They take a stand and make a bold proclamation. They make their presence known. It is almost tangible. In a sense, they are a presence. They are a force to be reckoned with. To manipulate, remove, or rearrange any of their major elements would be nearly unimaginable. The size, the arrangement of structure, ornamentation, and decoration, the shape, and form—these seem to be exactly as they are supposed to be.

Go for Beauty

As an “expat” Minnesotan, I can think of two buildings that quickly come to mind, one secular and one sacred—the Minnesota State Capitol Building and the Cathedral of St. Paul. Both domed edifices dominate the St. Paul skyline and anchor either end of John Ireland Boulevard which runs between and connects them. Both have a strong presence. Both demand one’s attention. Both communicate and proclaim that what takes place within them and what they represent are important and worthy of respect and veneration. The Capitol was built from 1896 to 1905; the Cathedral from 1907 to 1914, with work on the interior continuing until 1941 and beyond. Both are built in the Beaux-Arts architectural style popular in the United States in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.

In the State Capitol Building, the important (even if messy) work of government is carried out. The necessity and dignity of good government at the service of law and order and of the common good are manifested in the beauty and dignity of the building designed by Cass Gilbert, who also designed the United States Supreme Court Building in Washington, D.C.

The St. Paul Cathedral was designed by the French architect E. L. Masqueray, who also designed the cathedrals in Sioux Falls, SD, and in Wichita, KS, as well as many other lovely churches. However, none are as epic as the Cathedral of St. Paul. Archbishop John Ireland wanted to maintain a proper hierarchy of values in the design of what would be the fourth cathedral of the then-Archdiocese of St. Paul (now St. Paul and Minneapolis). He made sure that the superiority of God’s glory and of the worship of God taking place in the sacred liturgy was manifested through a building to rival the Capitol in majesty. The Cathedral was built on a more elevated point in the city of St. Paul, with a dome that reaches higher than that of the Capitol. The Capitol Building with its dome rises to a height of 223 feet, while the Cathedral with its dome soars well beyond, to 307 feet. (For the sake of fairness, it is worth noting that when comparing the domes alone, the Capitol’s dome is taller.) That 84-foot difference in height (already notable) is made even more dramatic by the approximately 40-foot difference in elevation of the land on which the buildings were built.

Cathedral and State

Impressive buildings like these two in St. Paul continue their work of making invisible values visible in the buildings’ interiors. For instance, great, large, heavy, and impressive doors—better referred to as portals—not only grant entry from the outside but transport one who enters from the realm of the day-to-day into a new world of principles and activity that have important and far-reaching consequences. Upon entering, one often finds oneself in an entryway or narthex. These are usually smaller, narrower, and darker spaces that prepare visitors to pass into a grand atrium, rotunda, or nave. The contrast between the spaces adds to the sense of awe as one enters the much grander primary room.

Classic civic buildings include grand stairways, elevated ceilings, domes and rotundas, statues, shiny marble floors, skylights, and beautiful works of art and decoration. All of these are meant to emphasize the degree of importance of each room or area, and the importance of the primary activity that takes place there, whether it be a supreme court, house, or senate chamber as in the Minnesota Capitol Building, or a county courtroom, a theater or auditorium, a library reading room, or a grand mansion. As with the buildings themselves, their interiors very often have a sense of “rightness” and presence. They possess dignity and decorum.

Classic churches have some overlapping elements with their civic counterparts, but churches, of course, also have elements that are unique because of what a church building is and what it is for. Rather than having multiple significant rooms for various important purposes, they are dominated by one primary “room,” made up of the nave and sanctuary. Depending on the church and its size, this area might also be composed of transepts, ambulatories, side chapels and shrines, confessionals, and a baptistry. There is very often a loft or gallery with space for the choir and the visible pipes and casing of a pipe organ. One dedicated room that is separate from all of this is the sacristy, where the sacred ministers prepare for the celebration of the Church’s liturgy. This room has its own dignity as the place of preparation for the sacred liturgy.

In these churches, the nave itself is beautiful and dignified because it is more than a functional part of the building that gives the congregation a place to gather and pray. It is also the place where holy worship is offered by the members of the Mystical Body of Christ along with the Head, who is Christ himself. Unlike in the pagan temples or in the Temple of Jerusalem where only the priests could enter to offer worship, now all the faithful may enter because they participate in the one priesthood of Christ and in the perfect offering of Christ to the Father through the common priesthood received at Baptism.

However, as important as the nave is, there is still hierarchy and directionality in the building. Everything is directed to the sanctuary, where all is made possible through the priest who presides over and celebrates the liturgy in persona Christi capitis, in the person of Christ the Head of the Church. There are found the ambo from which the Word of God is proclaimed, the chair from which the celebrant presides, the tabernacle in which the Blessed Sacrament is reposed, and most especially the altar on which the Sacrifice is offered.

Beyond the Threshold

In these powerful church buildings, the whole plan of architecture and decoration is designed to draw one’s attention to the sanctuary, and even more, to the altar. The altar is not a mere furnishing. It is not just one of the several items needed to celebrate Holy Mass. The altar is the focal point. It is part of the architecture of the building itself. In these churches it is exactly where it is supposed to be, seemingly where the various forces of nature and the geometry of the cosmos come together in a powerful way. Because of the altar’s elevation and its forward location in the church and in the sanctuary (meaning toward the apse), one’s attention is almost immediately drawn to it and even beyond it to the heavenly liturgy in which the earthly liturgy participates as a foretaste (cf. Sacrosanctum Concilium, 8), and to that place in the east (at least liturgical east toward the apse or tabernacle) where the sun rises daily and from whence the Son will arise ultimately on the last day when he comes again in all his glory.

These glorious and powerful buildings manifest a threshold, a point of passage into the world of higher and spiritual values. This is especially true of churches, which are meant to help us pass from earthly to heavenly realms. As the Catechism of the Catholic Church explains, “To enter the house of God [a church], we must cross a threshold, which symbolizes passing from the world wounded by sin to the world of the new Life to which all men are called” (CCC, 1186).

Romano Guardini writes of how the altar itself is also a threshold­­—in two senses. First, it is a threshold marking a borderline between the world of men and the world of God. The altar is a symbol that naturally reveals this reality. Guardini writes in Meditations before Mass, “the thoughtful believer does not have to be taught that it is a border, that ‘above it’ stretch inaccessible heights and ‘beyond it’ the reaches of divine remoteness; somehow he is aware of this.” All that is necessary on the believer’s part “is intrinsic readiness and calm reflection; then his heart will respond with reverence” (Romano Guardini, Meditations before Mass [Newman Press, 1955], 42).

The altar is a threshold also inasmuch as a threshold is a crossing over. The threshold of a doorway not only marks where the outside of a building meets the inside. It is where the two realms meet and what allows for the passage from the one to the other: “It is something that unites, a place of contact and encounter” (Guardini, 43). God himself has crossed the threshold from heaven to earth in the Incarnation of his Son. Through the Paschal Mystery of Christ, made present on the altar, and man’s participation in it through Baptism, the Holy Eucharist, and the other sacraments, man is enabled to cross the threshold from earth to heaven with Christ. Thus, writes Guardini, “The altar is the sign of God’s presence among us, in us. And the same altar suggests further that there is a way leading us, remote, isolated creatures that we are, back to our Creator; from the depths of our sin ‘up’ to His holiness; that we can follow it… His descent draws us upwards” (Guardini, 43-44).

Cosmic Power

The altars of many churches—especially those built in the United States in the latter part of the 19th and the first part of the 20th century—by their very position in the church and in the sanctuary, possess a powerful presence in a way analogous to the buildings themselves. They powerfully manifest the central importance of what takes place on them and the reality that they are thresholds between the human and the divine.

Two great Minnesota buildings—the Cathedral and the Capitol—as well as so many other civic and sacred buildings throughout the United States, were built not only for pragmatic reasons but to communicate higher truths and values. Their majesty and the power of their presence, which so often command attention, would seem to indicate that they—and the altars within the churches of this stature—are designed in accord with the very order of the universe, almost as if these buildings and their altars have been placed in the cosmos exactly where they were intended to be, tapping into and revealing some hint of the very fabric of creation. May we appreciate them and be inspired to build in such a way once again.