I love polychrome

Left-the colorful pulpit at Canterbury Cathedral.
Right-one of the new candlesticks for the chapel Altar of St. Alban's Episcopal School in Arlington, TX.

I have come to love polychrome church ornament, and it is a shame that we have been so afraid of color in American church architecture. The colors red, blue, and gold are the traditional colors for ornament in Christian churches. In fact, these three colors are common in religious structures throughout the world. Perhaps because they are essentially the primary colors, they seem to be particularly pleasing to the eye when used together, and they create an effect that highlights the glory of God in his creation.

Color is partularly delightful and appropriate for the house of the Lord. And interestingly enough, it's not a particularly low church vs. high church kind of thing (although, certainly the Puritan tradition found the use of color in church decoration particularly objectionable). Consider such colorful low church buildings as St. Bartholomew's Episcopal Church in NYC or Trinity Episcopal Church in Boston.

As our parochial school moved to a new campus, we have been putting together furniture for the chapel liturgies. A wonderful parishioner, Alex Mills, has constructed an Altar and cross for the new school. My wife Melisa will paint the corpus for the cross, and I have been working on painting ornament. So far, I've painted two candlesticks (pictured above) for use on the Altar with red, blue, and gold. The Altar and cross for the new school campus are still works in progress. I will post pictures when they become available.