The Symbolism of the Christian Church Building
Together with the Kraków Catholic Intelligentsia Club, we invite you to a series of lectures by Piotr Oleś OP on the symbolism of the Christian church building.
Watch the first lecture 1 hour
Together with the Kraków Catholic Intelligentsia Club, we invite you to a series of lectures by Piotr Oleś OP on the symbolism of the Christian church building. The meetings take place on the second Thursday of each month, from February to June, at 6 p.m. in the KIK lecture hall at 5 Sienna Street.
They will be about symbol in architecture and its links with symbols in the liturgy, from the Temple in Jerusalem, where the spring wells up, through Early Christian basilicas, Syrian churches and the great basilicas of Byzantium, to the Carolingians, the wonderful Middle Ages, the humanist Renaissance and the astonishing Baroque. All this slightly interwoven with philosophical threads and those small details which, through the documents of various councils, finally shaped what we call a Christian church.
Piotr Oleś – a Dominican, art historian, student at the College of Philosophy and Theology of the Polish Province of the Order of Preachers. He is fascinated by the way sacred architecture was shaped by liturgy and symbol, and sometimes tries to find out what came of it.
Recordings of the lectures are available in the relevant tab above, as well as on the pages of Liturgia.pl and as a handy podcast.
Admission free, no registration required.
1. The Dayspring from on high will visit us
In the first meeting devoted to the symbolism of the Christian church building, “The Dayspring from on high will visit us”, Br. Piotr Oleś OP spoke, among other things, about the principle of orienting churches towards the east.
2. Sol Iustitiae. In the brightness of eternal light
In the second meeting devoted to the symbolism of the Christian church building, “Sol Iustitiae. In the brightness of eternal light”, Br. Piotr Oleś OP spoke, among other things, about the symbolism of light in architecture, focusing especially on the Gothic period.
3. O blessed Jerusalem
In the third meeting devoted to the symbolism of the Christian church building, “O blessed Jerusalem”, Br. Piotr Oleś OP spoke about the church as a figure of the heavenly Jerusalem: about the symbolism of foundations, walls and supports.
4. Behold, its vault is like heaven without columns
In the fourth meeting devoted to the symbolism of the Christian church building, “Behold, its vault spreads out like heaven without columns”, Br. Piotr Oleś OP spoke about the symbolism of the vault and the dome as a figure of heaven and about the levels of meaning in the structure of the Byzantine church.
“The series is meant to try to refresh a skill that lies dormant in every person – often very deeply hidden by now: the skill of seeing symbolically”
Piotr Oleś OP
Lecturer
Collaborator of our Center
