Third Church Focused on Rights, Not Options
Marc Fisher writes up his notes on a government hearing to decide the fate of the downtown Brutalist building used by Third Church of Christ, Scientist. But he might as well have stayed home. Though he notes that the purpose of the hearing was to determine specifically whether staying in the building at 16th and I Streets NW presents a financial hardship for the church’s membership, the complaint and arguments that Fisher addresses in his summary are old hat to anyone who’s been following the issue.
For those who haven’t been keeping up, the question at hand — well, that depends on whom you ask. Fisher notes:
The question before [D.C. planning director Harriet] Tregoning is whether to approve the church’s inquiry to raze the building. But just as the city’s Historic Preservation Board refused to consider any First Amendment issue in the case–does a city government, trying to preserve its architectural heritage, have the right to tell a devout organization what to do with its sanctuary?–so too is Tregoning limiting testimony mainly to whether the Third Church would face an undue financial hardship whether it were forced to keep a building it says it cannot afford.
On that First Amendment issue: Architectural preservationists say it’s irrelevant. The practice of the church does not flow from the property (it’s not built on ancient Christian Scientist burial grounds for example). But the sanctuary on that property is fairly critical to District and architectural history. Where does the First Amendment become an issue?
One party that gets lost in the conversation about the costs imposed by the concrete-poured building (designed by Araldo Cassutta of I.M. Pei & Partners)? The Third Church of Christ, Scientist. It often seems, the way Fisher reports the issue, that some terrible group of Modernists came along and foisted that building upon a humble band of devout practitioners. But no: In fact, the Third Church of Christ, Scientist, commissioned and built that building, ostensibly seeking to benefit from its novel architecture. And until fall of that year, the church itself praised the award-winning architecture on its Web site and in church literature.
Photo used with permission under a Creative Commons license with Flickr user ElvertBarnes.
Were church officials unaware of maintenance costs entering in? Possibly. Sometimes unexpected costs crop up. Anticipated or not, are these costs exceptional? Not necessarily. Lighting costs for museums (or churches or any building that features novel architectural design, really) are frequently expensive considering those buildings have special lighting needs. Has the church done anything to reduce these costs, as preservationists have suggested?
Fisher’s perspective seems to be that practical suggestions for compromise — such as redesigning the interior (which is not protected by historical designation) or modifying the exterior or opening the building to other uses or selling the property and sanctuary outright — are all variations on an outrageous theme. He and church supporters are indignant. Why should the church compromise when it is so clearly obvious that the building is horribly ugly and it’s only a handful of pointy-headed architects who argue otherwise and besides, damnit, the building belongs to the church?
Yet at one point in the very recent past the Third Church of Christ, Scientist, thought that a Brutalist sanctuary was appealing sufficient to build. And once they made the decision to go there, they entered into an crucial architectural lineage. That building sufficed for the church for many years, but no longer does now. Nevertheless, the building itself has a concrete place in architectural history, and the argument that it is self-evidently ugly is totally subjective and beside the point. (Who decides what’s gorgeous? Fisher? Fenty? Who cares?)
Fisher notes that the church has spent upward of $100,000 fighting District bureaucracy in order to get precisely what it wants. Perhaps that cost should be submitted in the balance sheets, along with the costs of the various compromise options the church refuses to explore. And rather than rehash old arguments in favor of the church’s right not to compromise by the city’s right to preserve its architectural history, possibly Fisher and other church supporters should give a fair look at these compromise options.
Original post by Kriston Capps

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