‘Sense of Place’ on Sacred Cultural and Architectural Heritage: St. Peter’s Church of Melaka (original) (raw)
Related papers
The Significance of the "Sacred Space" in Two Communities
Communio Viatorum, 2002
This article, written first in the early 1990s, considers two communities. One, in Manchester, in north=west England, was faced with losing its church building, a large neo-Gothic church. The other, on the periphery of Belo Horizonte, Brazil, was in the process of building a church. The article considers the role of the church building in the lives of the poor.
Zeitschrift für junge Religionswissenschaft, 2014
Using the method of virtual ethnography, this article provides a contextualized analysis of the representation of a current construction project of a Brazilian neopentecostal church, the Igreja Universal do Reino de Deus, on the church's web sites. According to the church, this project is a rebuilding of the biblical Temple of Solomon. Based on a theoretical approach linking media-related and spatial theories of religion with a social scientific theory of space, the article shows, on the one side, how religious spaces are made accessible for believers and how the latter are invited to experience the transcendental with their senses via these spaces. On the other side, the importance this construction project has for the mentioned religious organization's institutional project is debated, as well as what kind of spatial strategies are being acted out by it and how it relates to the church's claims to religious universality.
The experience of the sacred through places of ritual in architecture
ANUARI d’Arquitectura i Societat, 2021
Les estructures socials i espacials, així com els llenguatges reconeguts i creats pels mestres del passat ja no són adequats en la nostra època actual. La pertinença a aquestes estructures hui ja no s’associa a la comunitat sinó a la xarxa.
Sacred places: spaces for a dialogue among cultures
Proceedings of Science and Technology, 2020
Background. The construction of a sacred space identifies a place where men realize a direct relationship with their God, qualifying this space as the absolute center of the existence, regardless of its location and its definition. In the sacred places, the geometric-dimensional relations, that define each space, are enriched with the temporal connotation, making more explicit the inseparable relationship between the architecture and the historical process (to stay erected in front of the history, following the more convincing anthropological meaning of the building action) with the material changes of the same architecture. Results. Then, each sacred place is the center (from which an axis is inevitably outlined) of a spatial dimension that is emancipated from pure physical conditions and it forces to involve tools of unusual analysis that fit the specificity of the use (in other words, the symbolic character). The sacred place assumes the role of an instrument of synthesis (of manifesto) that allows a vision of the world ables to build the dialogue among the cultures, overcoming the limits of the individual perspectives and fitting a community program based on the sharing of the Human Values. Conclusion. Given these premises, the paper reconsiders some studies of the history of the architecture that has given specific attention to the issue of the sacred place that is also seen as material and intangible space, where men meet their God, their self and the community. The contribution also analyzes experiences of realization of sacred spaces, between the second half of the nineteenth century and the first half of the twentieth, examining religious architecture in different geographic areas and with multiple cultures. These sacred spaces have often allowed overcoming the fracture caused by colonial politics, favoring the regeneration of the meaning of the sacred places.
INTERAÇÕES, 2010
RESUMO O artigo aborda a relação entre o entendimento filosófico da vida religiosa e a referência a lugar, como categoria espacial com o significado antropológico. Após breve exposição de alguns dos principais elementos da filosofia contemporânea acerca do conceito de lugar, aborda-se a questão do espaço sagrado de um ponto de vista epistemológico. Ao final, é feita uma aplicação dessa discussão ao conceito de santidade. ABSTRACT The article approaches the relationship between the philosophical understanding of religious life and the reference to place, as a spatial category with anthropological meaning. After a brief exposition of some of the main elements of contemporary philosophy of place, the question of sacred space is dealt with from an epistemological point of view. At the end, the discussion is applied to the concept of sanctity. KEYWORDS: Place. Religious knowledge. Sacred Space. Sanctity
Landmark Phenomenology of Sacred Architecture as Cultural Heritage
Cultural Urban Heritage, 2019
Multisensory experience is an important part of the perception of sacred architecture. It is important to understand that the content of sacred architecture as cultural heritage, in the complex way of understanding, is not only its historical, artistic or cultural value, but also its symbolic value. One of its symbolic aspects is the multisensory experience it creates. This assertion is based on the theoretical framework of the phenomenology of architecture, an aspect of architectural theory that explores the experience of the built. Every experience of architecture is multisensory, and in the case of sacred space this aspect particularly influences the experience of the believer and of the visitor of cultural heritage because architecture relates, mediates and projects meanings anchored in a complex experience of space. Different phenomena such as light, sound, smell and touch directly affect the experience of sacred architecture. They create specific atmospheres that are intrinsic...
PLACES OF WORSHIP Space and religion in Lisbon suburban configurations
PLACES OF WORSHIP Space and religion in Lisbon suburban configurations, 2017
The emergence of new religious movements is a global phenomenon. Although becoming subject of inquiry by recent academic works concerned with new spiritual content and practices, the places of worship persist an overlooked subject. The aim of this research is to understand the implications of spatiality in the constitution of the new places of worship within Lisbon suburbs after the 1970’s. It analyses the relationship between place centralities and new spatial cultures and urbanities in suburban landscapes. It also analyses change and persistence of traditional pattern of sacred spaces. To pursue these aims space syntax methodology was used in order to analyse street networks configuration to understand location of places of worship. The main technic was segment analysis. The syntactic measures were calculated to understand the relationship between global and local structures and read the city as a whole (urban and suburban). Using GIS software, places of worship were mapped within Lisbon region according to different religions. The patterns of distribution are then compared with the syntactic measures. The results have confirmed the hypothesis of space dematerialization and placelessness which characterizes the new religious movements. The pattern of distribution of places of worship (factories, warehouses, shops, cinemas, etc.) in Lisbon region follow places of good accessibility (global and local). The value of space remains not in its simbology but in its accessibility and functionality.
Identity and architectural values of the monastery of São Bento de Cástris in the period 1957-2005
2017
Identity is part of the architectural heritage, related directly to the cultural values of the place. In Portugal the monasteries were significantly changed after 1834, reason why they are architectural entities whose materiality reflects the adaptations to which they have been subjected over time, integrating its authenticity. This is the case of the Monastery of São Bento de Cástris, in Évora, which had several uses through time, adapting the place to allow its physical continuity. Through the study of its materiality it was sought to recognize the identity of the place between 1957-2005, when it was used as the male section of Casa Pia, a child care institution. This study aims to contribute to a future intervention methodology that considers the material values of the Monastery, due to the need to safeguard this currently abandoned place. This will contribute to regain a new collective esteem, essential for its continuity
IAEME, 2019
As a reaction to the phenomenon of the desacralization of Catholic church architecture after the Second Vatican Council, many studies have examined the relationship between the liturgical activities and the architectural form of the Catholic church. However, the research that addressed the issue about the meaning of Catholic Church's architectural form is still a rarity. This study aims to explicate the meaning of architectural form in one of the oldest Catholic churches in Jakarta, Indonesia, namely the Santa Theresia Church. The analytical steps were to describe all the composition and property in each scope of the building, then interpret the meaning that is expressed based on the theory of meanings in architecture. Based on this theory, it can be seen whether the meaning displayed by the Santa Theresia church architecture tends to be perceptual, cultural, or ideological. The analysis showed that the dominance of the Catholic symbol supported by site composition, building mass, the inner space and building elements act as the basis for the appearance of the divine ideological meaning. In addition to enriching the realm of substance and methods of architectural knowledge, this research is also useful for practitioners and stakeholders involved in the design of the Catholic Church