Catholic World News News Feature

Modernism Triumphs in the Eternal City January 09, 2002

By Duncan G. Stroik

In its earthly state the Church needs places where the community can gather together. Our visible churches, holy places, are images of the holy city, the heavenly Jerusalem, toward which we are making our way on pilgrimage. Catechism of the Catholic Church, 1198

A recent architectural competition held by the diocese of Rome leads one to believe that the city’s vicariate thinks the future of Church architecture lies in the recent past. To be precise, the Church of Rome seems to suggest that new architecture should be based firmly on the tradition of mid-20th-Century modernism.

On the eve of the