One of the most important aspects of the worship space is its acoustical properties. This is so because of the importance of sounds in worship, the sound of verbal proclamation and musical prayer and praise.
“What no eye has seen, nor ear heard, nor human heart conceived, what God has prepared for those who love Him, God has revealed to us through the Spirit” (1 Cor. 2:9–10).
On a visit to the city of Meissen, Saxony, in early May of 1985, I was given an opportunity to tour the magnificent Gothic cathedral, the construction of which was begun in the year 1260 and largely completed late in the 15th century when the lower portions of the west towers were built by Arnold of Westfaha (Cf. Paul Liebe and Hermann Klemm, Meissen: Der Dom und seine Geschichte [Berlin: Evangelische Verlagsanstalt, n.d.], pp. 11–36). The woman who guided us through the cathedral began the tour by saying, “We would not build a building for the church like this today because we have a different understanding of the church.” What a church understands itself to be determines what kind of building it builds and, simultaneously, what kind of acoustical requirements it expects of its building.
Our guide in Meissen was giving simple expression to an observation by French sociologist Emile Durkhelm (1858–1917), who said, “A society is not simply the mass of individuals that comprise it, nor the territory it occupies, nor the things it uses, nor the movements it carries out, but above all it is the idea that it has of itself (Quoted by Leonardo Boff, Church: Charism and Power [New York: Crossroad, 1986], 41). The idea that the medieval church had of itself was that of “salvation institution,” a society whose leaders could confer salvation upon its individual members, provided that those members fulfilled the minimum conditions required for salvation (Cf. Avery Dulles, Models of the Church [Garden City, New York: Doubleday and Company, Inc., 1974], 31-39). Since the minimum conditions required for salvation consisted of participation in certain sacraments, the buildings constructed in the high Middle Ages were intended for the administration of baptism and the medieval Mass. Baptism was administered outside of the gathered congregation, usually with no more than family members and friends in attendance. No attention to acoustics was required for its administration.
Buildings were constructed chiefly for the administration of the medieval Mass, the main sacrament for the congregation assembled on Sundays and Holy Days. Although the mass was “said” or—on festive occasions—“sung,” it was meant to be primarily a visual event rather than an audible event. It was mean to be seen, not heard. Bard Thompson has described the “three conceptions” that attained prominence in the Middle Ages: (1) the Mass as an “epiphany” or God amongst men, which focused attention upon the reality of the eucharistic presence, upon the consecration at which it occurred, and upon the priest by whose action it was effected; (2) the Mass as a sacrifice offered unto God for the benefit of the living and the dead; and (3) the Mass as an allegorical drama of the whole economy of redemption (see Bard Thompson, Liturgies of the Western Church [Cleveland: The World Publishing Company, 1961], 48).
Even though the events were available to the eye, the Mass was directed toward God, not toward the congregation. The “drama” of Christ’s sacrifice upon the cross was once again offered to God by means of the “consecration,” which transformed the elements of bread and wine into Christ’s sacrificed body and shed blood. Because the consecrated bread, now Christ’s body, could be preserved in more or less elaborate tabernacles, the building became literally “the House of God.” The ever-burning lamp indicated the location of God, who was there, available for the prayers and devotions of the individual worshiper.
The Lutheran Reformation of the sixteenth century articulated a different understanding of the church with very significant implications for the spaces that such an understanding required. The Augsburg Confession defined the church as “the assembly of all believers among whom the Gospel is preached in its purity and the holy sacraments are administered according to the Gospel” (Theodore G. Tappert, ed., The Book of Concord [Philadelphia: Muhlenberg, 1959], 32). The focus here was not on the leadership of the community but on the baptized people. They were regarded as visible, available to the eye when they gathered. Their gathering was identified as “church” by what took place when they gathered, namely, the proclamation of the Christian good news and the administration of the “holy sacraments” identified and defined by that Christian good news. The primary sacrament that took place in the gathering of the baptized people was the Holy Eucharist. But in the Christian gospel, as the Lutheran Reformation understood it, the Holy Eucharist was not directed toward God as a re-presentation of Christ’s sacrifice. It was directed toward the people as God’s good news to them that the great benefit of Christ’s sacrifice is for them. It was available to them here and now in the promise of Christ to be present as the One who was crucified for them, namely the promise to give them his body and blood under the forms of bread and wine for their forgiveness, life, and salvation.
Both proclamation and Eucharist were meant for the ear as well as for the eye. The buildings of the Christian community were no longer to be understood as houses for God. They were to be houses for the People of God, spaces in which they would be addressed by the Word of God and participate in a sacrament in which the presence of God was promised to them through bread and wine, which they were to eat and drink. Hence Luther could say that “the church is a Mundhaus, the place of the mouth and salutary speech, not a Federhaus, the domain of the scribe” (Cited by David Lotz, “The Proclamation of the World in Luther’s Thought,” Word and World 3:4 [Fall 1983]: 347). In Luther’s own words:
The gospel should really not be something written, but a spoken word that brought forth the Scriptures, as Christ and the apostles have done. This is why Christ himself did not write anything but only spoke. He called his teaching not Scripture but gospel, meaning good news or a proclamation that is spread not by pen but by word of mouth. (Martin Luther, “A Brief Instruction on What to Look for and Expect in the Gospels,” Luther’s Works, American ed., vol. 35 [Philadelphia: Muhlenberg, 1960], 123)
In 1523 Luther directed that the words of Christ used in the Eucharist were “to be recited in the same tone of voice in which the Lord’s Prayer is sung at another place in the Canon; so that it will be possible for those standing by to hear” (“Formula Missae et Communionis of 1523,” in Thompson, Liturgies of the Western Church, 112). “The Peace of the Lord” is “to be announced with face turned to the people, as the bishops were accustomed to do” (Ibid.). Three years later Luther wrote that “in the true Mass … of real Christians, the altar could not remain where it is and the priest would always face the people as doubtless Christ did in the Last Supper” (Ibid., 130–131).
Thus both proclamation and sacrament would now require church builders to take acoustics into account. The first space constructed under the influence of the Lutheran Reformation was the chapel for the castle of the Elector of Saxony at Torgau. It has a free-standing Table on a platform raised two steps above the floor, accessible to communicants on all four sides, and a prominent pulpit. (A photograph of the interior of the chapel is reproduced in Peter Manns, Martin Luther: An Illustrated Biography [New York: Crossroad, 1982], p. 200, plate no. 82.) Luther preached the sermon at the dedication of the chapel. In his sermon, he added prayer to the acoustical activity of the gathered people of God.
Therefore God very wisely arranged and appointed things, and instituted the holy sacrament to be administered in the congregation at a place where we can come together, pray, and give thanks to God.… And here the advantage is that when Christians thus come together their prayers are twice as strong as otherwise.… Prayer is nowhere so mighty and strong as when the whole multitude prays together. (Luther’s Works, American ed., vol. 51 [Philadelphia: Muhlenberg, 1959], 337-338)
It is impossible to claim that Protestants followed their own Reformation insights in understanding both church and liturgy so that this understanding determined the construction of buildings for worship. In fact, Protestants and Catholics alike were affected by a variety of influences upon buildings and worship, most of which were not especially attentive to the acoustical dimension of the Christian gospel.
However, attention to the eschatological horizon of the New Testament in recent decades has given Protestants and Catholics a new and increasingly convergent perspective on the Christian gospel, on ecclesiology, on worship, and Eucharist that has profoundly affected the approach to Christian architecture. I want to summarize briefly what I think that eschatological horizon is, what its effects have been, and what its implications are for Christian architecture and its acoustical dimension.
1. The witness of the New Testament is that the Christian gospel is profoundly eschatological. The proclamation of Jesus can be summarized by the Gospel of Mark: “The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand; repent, and believe in the gospel” (Mark 1:15). The witness of the earliest disciples proclaims that Jesus has been raised from the dead. Jesus is therefore the Messiah, and the messianic age has begun. Jesus’ resurrection is a radical revelation of the eschaton, the outcome of history. Because Jesus has been raised, he and no one else determines that outcome. The kingdom of God has begun and will finally triumph. Death no longer has the last word. The resurrection of Jesus affirms Jesus’ mission, proclaims his death as redemptive, and confers the eschatological Holy Spirit on the community of Jesus’ disciples.
2. The community of Jesus’ disciples is called to be a witness to the resurrection of Jesus, a witness to the breaking in of the kingdom of God. The event of Jesus’ resurrection, which calls the disciple community, also shapes what the community does when it gathers for worship.
a. The disciple community appropriates anew the Scriptures of Israel and the remembrance of Jesus as it listens to the reading and exposition of lessons from the canon of the Scriptures. The disciple community has its matrix in Israel and in the mission of Israel’s Messiah, Jesus of Nazareth. It is marked by its attention to “apostolic teaching” (Acts 2:42).
b. The disciple community engages in prayer in the name of Jesus. The prayer formula given to the circle of Jesus’ disciples (Luke 11:1–4) means participation in Jesus’ mission. It is the foundation for all prayer in the community. Prayer in the name of Jesus means attention to the needs of the community for its mission of witness to the kingdom of God.
c. The disciple community celebrates in anticipation the banquet of the messianic age (Isa. 25:6–8). The meal of the community includes the following: first, the offering of bread and wine as symbolic of the offering of all the baptized to the purposes of the kingdom of God (Rom. 12:1–2); second, the thanksgiving of the community under the leadership of the presiding minister as the way in which the community receives the promise of Jesus to be present with his body and blood in, with, and under the bread and wine; third, the eating and drinking through which the death of Jesus is proclaimed as shaping the community for its mission in and on behalf of the world as the body of Christ.
d. The disciple community sings the “new song” by which it celebrates the victory of God and anticipates the final eternal praise of God in the eschaton.
3. All of these elements, essential to the worship of the gathered community, require the ear to receive as well as the eye. The gathering of the community for attention to the Scriptures of Israel and the apostles, for prayer in the name of Jesus, for the eucharistic banquet of the messianic age, and for the new song of God’s victory is and is meant to be, visible, that is, available to the eye. It is meant to be seen in such a way that this gathering can be distinguished from other gatherings, that is, as a church rather than as a meeting of stockholders, a musical concert, an instructional class, and so on. But these visible activities have an audible dimension. Scriptures are meant to be read and expounded so that those present are addressed so that those who have ears to hear can hear. Prayers are said so that those present can assent with “amen” or can raise their own voices for the amen of others. The bread and cup are not just distributed for eating and drinking. That would not yet be the messianic banquet under the conditions of anticipation. Rather the bread and cup need to be taken up into the words of blessing and remembrance, thanksgiving and proclamation, by which bread and cup are audibly linked with the promises of Christ (Eric W. Gritsch and Robert W. Jenson, Lutheranism [Philadelphia: Fortress, 1976], 83-84). The new songs are sung in such a way that the whole community is drawn into the praise and anticipation of eternity.
What had not, prior to Jesus’ resurrection, been disclosed to eye and ear and human heart has now been revealed through the eschatological Spirit. It is now available to the eye and ear and heart. What is made visible and audible can now be received in faith. It must be visible and audible for faith to occur, for “faith must have something to believe—something to which it may cling and upon which it may stand” (Martin Luther, “Large Catechism,” The Book of Concord, p. 440).
Hence architecture for Christian worship needs to create space in which speaking and hearing, addressing and responding, sharing a meal in the context of promissory eschatological words, and singing the new song can take place. We need attention to acoustics in such a way that no artificial amplification of the human voice is needed. Architects can be attentive to such requirements for Christian worship. Eliel Saarinen designed a building for Christ Lutheran Church in Minneapolis, Minnesota, in 1951 in which the human voice could be heard by more than six hundred persons without amplification. Musical leadership was still required to come from a balcony in the rear, so only speaking leadership could be seen as well as heard. But Saarinen gave attention to hearing. The chapel of Trinity Lutheran Seminary in Columbus, Ohio, designed by McDonald, Cassell, and Bassett, Inc., and completed in 1983, allows the musical as well as the speaking leadership to be seen. Attention to acoustics is such that a congregation of six hundred can hear speaking without amplification. Singing the new song takes place in a space that the music critic of the Columbus Dispatch described as “like sitting inside a gigantic cello” because it has both resonance and clarity.
The church is called by its gospel, its liturgy, and its mission to give attention to acoustics in advance of constructing its buildings, not after the fact. For “what no eye has seen, nor ear heard, nor the human heart conceived, what God has prepared for those who love him,” God has revealed to us through the Spirit.