Germany

Long ago and Far away, before I’d learned about aperture and shutter speed and all that jazz, I had the privilege of going on a study tour in college with a few of my best buds. Armed with a point and shoot camera we got to travel five countries with a knowledgeable English professor and the lady who got me through college.

I thought I’d spend a few post reminiscing  this trip via blog style.

Sit back and cringe politely to yourself, because yes, this is going to be worse than your great aunt Susan's 200 slides of the family ski trip. Wait, who am I kidding….who even knows what a slide is these days?….It will be worse than the  900 page photo album on Facebook of your friend’s first child.  Basically what I’m trying to say is, YES these will be boring for some of you but that’s why there's an amazing little thing to the left of your browser called the scroll bar!

FRANKFURT

Little town, little quiet village, that pretty much sums up the preserved medieval town of Frankfurt. We saw some gorgeous scenery from the bus window, in fact it’s pretty much safe to say that throughout our whole trip there were breathtaking views zooming past us. I wish I could take the whole trip again played at a different speed.

Here’s what my sweet hubby looked like in those days. I still really cherish the fact that we got to travel together so much while we were dating. He looks so young to me!

Here’s Anne, another best friend, you’ll be seeing her a lot in these trip pictures. We kept finding the strangest doors, so she’s modeling this one for you (and the flowers below). Is it just me, or does Frankfurt look just like Charleston? I think it’s the horses.

One thing that truly blows me away is the architecture in churches. All across Europe are places of worship. There are grassy hillocks with piles of stones where men in linen abide to a simple life. There are intricate flying buttresses supporting the monstrous stone cathedrals where men chant and hold to custom and creed.

All throughout history men have made a conscious decision to slave over, construct, and form:  a towering pinnacle, a directional column, a light filled chamber, a heavily carved memorial, a brilliant fresco or even a simple wood cross all with unified purpose. They were intended to point man towards God, to put us in his splendor, to remind us of worship. The illusion works, visual structures move us. When you walk into the main hall of the church pictured below you are reduced to a small and inferior creature reminded of greater things.

But on the flip side, it was man who constructed and man who is corrupted, so even something built with good intentions or pretentions often became a point of man’s power, man’s glory, man’s prestige. Walking into the great churches in Europe evokes a bittersweet beauty. We witness the great effort of man (or perhaps God through man) to preserve faith but when you actually see people, you know that their hearts are far away from seeking God. The main attitude seems to be apathy, and agnosticism, even in those who sit the pews.