Sacred Spaces

Before we left, I mentioned to Lauren that I thought I would tour sacred spaces during our travels, and not only churches, but all sacred spaces upon which we came. In our visits in Bath and in the stone circles in the surrounding counties, we visited sacred spaces that were sacred 2,500 years before Christ, at the time of Christ, and in the centuries since.

As we walked and walked, we passed dozens and dozens of churches, and I never passed one that I did not pause and gaze. Some churches I entered and felt the light inside, wandered slowly up the side aisles, viewing chapels if in the larger churches, altars tucked inside alcoves in the small churches. Many, many others I did not enter, but slowed my step and looked up at the towers or steeples, the high arched windows, the solid stone upon stone standing for centuries. Even without entering, I was lifted up by these old sacred spaces.

Below are: Bath Abbey, completed in 1589 on the site of monastery a 1,000 years old; the sunlit inner courtyard of the cloisters at Lacock Abbey; stained glass windows over the altar in St. Andrews Church in Castle Combe; the Cathedral of St. Vincent in Saint-Malo; Westminster Abbey as seen from the west along Abingdon Street; Notre Dame de Paris as seen from the Left Bank of the Seine River; and the steeple over Abbey of Mont-Saint-Michel.