How do churches and ministries—and the buildings they occupy—become transparent and complementary parts of the surrounding community? This is a question raised by many spiritual leaders, as well as facility design and construction experts.
In the Mar/Apr issue of WFM , we take a look at St. Hilda’s House in the heart of West Harlem. St. Hilda’s is an interesting example of a ministry devoted to sharing God’s calling card and to actively functioning in tune with its surroundings in the process (you'll find it on page 14, “A Forward Retreat,” by contributor Rachel Allen). While the compact “green” convent isn’t formally open to the community, it is a home base for community outreach for the Sisters of the Community of the Holy Spirit. The sisters’ new sustainable structure rests on a small, 3,300-square-foot site in the heart of an historic urban district. It provides respite in a bustling cityscape, and yet it’s designed to be transparent—“The abundant windows also create two-way awareness with passersby…. ”—and to work within its local landscape by using space wisely and helping conserve the water and electricity available to the city’s borough.
A small chapel at St. Hilda's brims with activity in four services each day for the sisters. A second floor contains guest rooms and office space for the sisters who provide spiritual counseling. On top of the building, two green roofs offer more space for prayer and meditation, as well as gardens that help fortify the sisters' kitchen. Not only do the rooftops allow the sisters to live outdoors as well as in, but, as the story recounts, “By incorporating plant life on the roofs of the building, designers engineered a natural—and free—cooling system.”
The story of St. Hilda's facility, its larger place within the landscape of its community, and the intertwined commitment of its inhabitants to protect and nurture the very earth on which it rests, makes me appreciate even more fully the deep connection between a building and its potential “place” within a community. A building can be much more than a building. It can be anything in God's hands.
