Churches

Hello my siblings in Christ, my name is Bojan. I’m Fr. John’s friend and I live in Serbia. Today let’s talk about different kinds of Orthodox churches.

Have you ever noticed that Orthodox churches look very different? Some have domes on top, some don’t. Some have a huge iconostasis some have a very small one. Some churches are very light inside, others are dark. Why are they all so different? I bet you can guess part of the answer to this question. That’s right! Part of the reason why Orthodox churches in different places look so different is because the people in those places like different things. In Russia, for instance, it is very popular to put onion domes on top of churches. The domes is called an onion because it looks… well… like an onion. But the shape is actually supposed to look like fire - the fire of the Holy Spirit resting on the church. This style of dome is not popular in other countries like Romania. The monks on Mt. Athos really like the iconostasis to fill up all the space between the altar, where the priest stands, and the nave where you and I stand. But in places like Greece the iconostasis is not usually so big.

By the way, Fr. John tells me hat you are going to have an iconostasis in your church very soon! Anyway, part of the reason churches look different is because people like different things. Another reason why churches look different is that building material is different in different places. Syria is very rocky and so lots of churches are built out of stone. But the Ukraine has huge forests so churches there tend to be made of wood. Churches also look different based on how much they can afford to spend on building. Churches with lots of money can afford to build huge buildings with very fancy materials. Churches that don’t have much money must build much smaller and more modest buildings. One may look more splendid than the other

but both are equally pleasing to God. But the way the church is built isn’t just a matter of what people like and can afford. It also tells us something about what we believe. A long church with no dome is called a basilica. The shape of the basilica is supposed to remind you of a boat. In fact the word for where you and I stand during the service, the “nave,” comes from the Latin word “ship.” We are all in the boat of the church sailing toward the kingdom of God. In churches that have a dome - sometimes more than one dome - the idea is that the eternal kingdom of heaven, represented by the dome, rests on top of us when we are in the church. Heaven and earth are drawn together and united. Both ideas - the idea of a ship sailing to heaven, and of earth and heaven being drawn together in the church building - are true. They can both be found in the bible. So when you see different kinds of Orthodox churches don’t worry that one kind is wrong. Ask yourself what the church building is telling us about our Orthodox faith. There is almost something good we can learn when we think about our church buildings in this way. 

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