This is the second in a series on the traditional meaning of Catholic Church architecture. The first is HERE.
Conjurer, if you will, the biblical image presented to us in Genesis 3:8: “…they heard the sound of the Lord God walking about in the garden at the breezy time of the day…”
The Garden of Eden “was not intended as a paradise for the human race, but as a pleasure park for God; the man tended it for God.”1 And, while the meaning of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil from which man was forbidden to eat, is disputed, what is not disputed is that by eating of the forbidden fruit man believed he could make the garden his own or, at least, become a co-owner of it, with God.
For his willful attempt to span the gulf between the creature and Creator on his own, man was ejected from God’s Garden, the entrance guarded against his return by an angel holding a flaming sword.
(click on pictures to see clearer images)

The interior of Solomon’s Temple was decorated in imitation of God’s “pleasure park” with cherubim, palm-trees, and open flowers, all overlaid with gold. (Picture Source)
It my last post, I explored the idea of the church building as the Heavenly Temple. In this post I maintain that garden imagery has often been traditionally used in conjunction with the Temple arrangement. The connection goes back to the First Jerusalem Temple in which the walls were lined with cedar on which were carved figures of cherubim, palm-trees, and open flowers, all overlaid with gold. The two images converge: Temple and God’s “pleasure park”, God’s Garden.
In the Jerusalem Temple God was especially ‘present’ in the Holy of Holies and Sanctuary or Holy Room. The priests of the Temple walked around in the Temple as God walks around in His Garden. The High Priest, alone, entered the Holy of Holies. Adam and Eve and their offspring were banned from the garden and so the Israelites were kept outside the Jerusalem Temple, in the forecourts.

The apse end of San Clemente Basilica in Rome displays a profusion of vegetation, saints, and angels, a heavenly vision post Redemption. (right) Dominating the apse in San Clemente –in the center of the Garden -is the “tree of life”- the cross of Christ from which new life sprouts to fill the cosmos. (Pictures Source)
But, with the Incarnation, man has once again been granted admittance to the Garden. The Father, in sending the Son, has bridged the gulf between creature and Creator in the only direction possible –Creator to creature. God has invited us back into the Garden and even made us co-owners, inheritors with Christ. Man has been deified (sanctified) through the Incarnation.2 To make this theological point, the Christian church building has traditionally been decorated with garden imagery, sometimes profusely so. The priests of the Church walk around in the chancel as the Old Testament priests walked around in the Temple and Holy of Holies. The difference, of course, is that Adam is back in the Garden, inside the Temple. No longer outside, we are there with Christ, our Lord.

Natural forms are often interpreted in abstract patterns suggestive of the richness of the decorations in a throne room which begs analogy to the richness of life in God’s Garden. Our Lady of Victory/Saint Joseph Church in Rochester has beautiful stained glass windows edged with open flowers or vines. Geometric patterns fill the center field of the windows. (right) Detail of a window in Our Lady of Victory/Saint Joseph Church, Rochester, NY.

Often liturgical art reflects the garden theme by enmeshing saints, angels and symbols in vegetation and abstracted natural forms.
To decorate the church building in imitation of the Garden is to remind us of God’s boundless mercy and our deification in Christ our Lord. When we construct churches that look more like plain conference halls or auditoriums are we sufficiently predisposing worshipers to receive the graces offered us in the Sacrifice of the Mass? To be sure, the Mass is still efficacious but are we addressing ALL the senses in such bland environments. God saw that His creation was good; are we to judge that the representation of His work is not worthy or, worse yet, a distraction. Did not the Incarnation renew the entire cosmos?

It would be difficult to find a contemporary Catholic church, built in the last 40 years, that expresses the joyful celebration of our new life in God’s Garden. (Basilica of St Peter and St Paul, Prague, Czech Republic. Picture Source)

Here is a very early use of Garden imagery to represent the hope of Christians. Saint (Bishop) Apollinare leads into paradise the faithful (the sheep) that had been entrusted to him on earth. The saint and his flock are there because of the cross of Christ which is displayed above them in a golden sky, in a vision of the Transfiguration. (Sant’Apollinare in Classe, Italy; apse mosaic 6th)

Here we can see the four streams watering the Garden, in this case at the bottom of the cross. The four streams of Genesis are often interpreted as a type for the four gospels refreshing and stimulating new life in the world of time. Basilica of San Clemente, Rome. Picture Source)

The ribs in this ceiling vault in the Abbey Church of Bath, England, suggest the palm trees mentioned in the Garden of Eden and represented in Solomon’s Temple.

A profusion of decoration and aversion to empty space suggests the abundance of life in the spirit; the fullness of life in Christ, in the Garden. Empty or plain space would suggest a lack of “life”. (From a church in Peru)
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1 Commentary to Genesis 2:8, Garden in the East, New American Bible, Revised Edition
2 The Redemption, of course, was accomplished in both the Incarnation and the Death and Resurrection of Christ. But in the Eastern Church the Incarnation (and Resurrection) is stressed while in the Western Church the Crucifixion has traditionally been emphasized. Deification is the term most used in the East to refer to Redeemed Man while Sanctification is the term most often utilized in the West.
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I never fail to be amazed at how rich Catholic heritage is, even if I am ignorant of 99% of it. Thanks for these lovely pieces.
Bernie,
Thank you for an excellent essay, and for the theology as well. I probably learned at one point that Paradise was God’s garden, and Man was to care for it, but I had forgotten. This makes the Fall and the Driving out of the Garden, and Christ’s necessary sacrifice to atone for our sins much easier to grasp. When I enter a truly beautiful church, it represents the Garden, both the original and the final garden of Heaven, to which I desire to go. A picture is worth a thousand words, and you have made the importance of truly heavenly church architecture come alive for me. So let us work (and pray) in our parishes and dioceses to encourage our pastors to always build with this ideal in mind. Goodness, Truth and Beauty, Praise you Lord!
What is your opinion of Gaudi’s “Sagrada Familia” Basilica in Barcelona?