[goat granny]

Way back when, the inner cities had beautiful churches...My husband took me to a church he use to go to in Detroit...(Back in the 1960's) It was closing up shop and we had to go next door to the convent to get a nun to let us in...The church was built in the 1800's and everything was hand carved. Pews were beautiful, the sanctuary was awesome, had carved cross's, stations of the cross, and the priest didn't give the sermon from the sanctuary, He walked down the middle isle and there were circular steps to a podium (?) that rose above the pews and gave his sermon. Everything even the steps were works of art...

All those beautiful church's are gone along with the large cities...No more parishioners, they moved out to the subs. when forced busing started...

There would be a church like that every 1/2 mile...

[livius]

It’s really sad. Those churches cost those people a lot of money and they were very proud of them.

I always think that the real problem was that the Church just shrugged and walked away, instead of trying to convert the new residents of the area. They shouldn’t have let it all go so easily. Also, once the Church gave up, the whole neighborhood imploded.

[Straight Vermonter]

...there were circular steps to a podium (?) that rose above the pews and gave his sermon.

This is from the church that I attended as a child. The pulpit pictured here was destroyed as part of the post V2 wreckovation. The church was beautifully restored a few years ago to (mostly) it's former glory but the pulpit is sadly gone forever.