The Church Meets the Humpty Dumpty Zoning Ordinance

“We shape our buildings, and afterwards our buildings shape us.”

— Winston Churchill

Near the end of World War II, Winston Churchill remarked of war-torn England, "We shape our buildings, and afterwards our buildings shape us." Churchill understood buildings as more than pretty pictures on souvenir postcards. We learn many things from the bricks, stone, mortar, sidewalks, streets, and plazas in many cities. Our buildings, rooms, corridors, streets, sidewalks, landscapes, and skyscapes affect and influence us in profound ways.

How to Listen to a Building

“Without an appreciation for the intrinsic message of our media, we can contradict ourselves without realizing it — or we can make so muich noise, we actually drown out what we are trying to say.”

Once upon a time, the people who built churches believed the building could talk. Today, many of the people who build churches for a living don't know what their buildings are saying. The buildings still speak, but mostly the messages are unintentional. And regrettably some church buildings actually contradict what is being preached from the pulpits in those buildings.