McCallum: Steeples

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(Host) In winter, Vermonters can see further across the stark landscape,
noticing things that are less visible with foliage on the trees.
Educator, writer and commentator Mary McCallum says it offers a better
view of an architectural detail that serves as a beacon to travelers and
churchgoers alike.

(McCallum) When you approach a Vermont
village by way of a wide open landscape, what you often see first is a
white steeple that punctuates the sky and announces the location of a
church. Early American villages commonly made their churches the tallest
buildings in town and the heart of the community, visible by their
graceful spires.

My own small town has four steeples of varying
height that go largely unnoticed until they need painting or repair. And
while there is no entry for steeplejack in the current Occupational
Outlook Handbook, they are the fearless workers that are still called
upon to scale the heights to patch the holes and renew peeling paint. In
1891, a hardy crew re-anchored the 190-foot steeple on Rutland’s Grace
Congregational Church after church fathers discovered it was swaying
dangerously during high winds.

Now, I’m not a churchgoer, but
I’ve always taken note of historic houses of worship when traveling. I
remember a small city on the Missouri River with a sky pierced by a
forest of spires, and wondered how all those nineteenth century
buildings got filled on Sundays. As a child, I remember being amazed by a
lone white clapboard roadside church that relied on a neon sign
announcing ‘Jesus Saves’ to make its presence known – instead of its
short, unimpressive tower. Here, we’re not usually quite so flashy – and
steeples are still the most common visual guideposts for finding a
church.

I first became aware of this phenomenon through an
online article with the alarming headline, How the Internet is Killing
Off Church Steeples. The premise is that as steeples age, maintenance
costs rise and congregations shrink, the church spire has outlived its
usefulness as a signpost. People now rely on the internet to find
churches, with Google reporting that quick ‘searches for churches’ spike
just before every religious holiday.

Yet the technology that
enables us to find a church with just a keystroke may also provide the
funds for preserving steeples that are in need of repair and restoration
– as cash-strapped churches buy into the trend of renting out their
church steeples as cellphone towers.

Even the historic Brandon
Congregational Church has sprouted one of these towers without changing
the mission of its white cupola and steeple. While the tower silently
transmits and receives the thousands of radio signals that allow area
cell phone users to stay connected, the old steeple supporting it
continues to announce to those who take the time to look up, "Here we
are, this is the place, you have arrived."

Not so very long ago,
every Vermont village had a clearly visible center, recognizable from a
distance, and distinguished by an architectural convention that was
both spiritual and utterly practical.

And these iconic white spires punctuating the landscape continue to shine as beacons for us today.

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