Moncton Faith Buildings: A Digital Cathedral and a Free Meeting House
Our second stop of my family’s eastern tour was Moncton, New Brunswick. We were on our way out to PEI, but, of course, had to stop to see some repurposed faith buildings on the journey. After all, if you’re going to drive 16 hours one way, you better make it count!
In Moncton, we stopped in on two completely different sites, The Free Meeting House (https://www.tourismnewbrunswick.ca/Products/F/FreeMeetingHouseNationalHistoricSite/) and La Cathédrale Notre-Dame de l’Assomption (www.mr21.ca).
The Free Meeting Houseis a federally designated historic site built in 1821. Built by the community it was used by multiple religious groups including Protestant, Roman Catholic and Jewish until they had the ability to build their own religious gathering spaces. As the plaque onsite says it stands as a monument to community activism and religious tolerance.
The Free Meeting House housed its last congregation in 1963 and is now run by Resurgo Place, the Moncton Museums groups that has the oversite and running of three historic sites and a museum. While there is no congregation currently there, the space is rented for weddings, events and religious gatherings and is preserved for the community.
Just a few blocks away from the Free Meeting House is La Cathédrale Notre-Dame de l’Assomption which currently has installations by Ameri Ka Productions who has created a Digital Cathedral exploring this first Acadian church in Moncton. Using interactive screens and surround screen videos, Ameri Ka Productions has provided interpretation of the stained glass (much of it too high up to be seen otherwise), the building of the cathedral and the Acadian people of the region. The site opened this past August and they are anticipating adding additional elements over time.
I haven’t seen a site like this before that uses technology to this degree in order to illuminate the sacred details of the faith building and the histories of the people who built it. The closest version to it that I’ve visited was Aura at the Notre Dame Basilica in Montreal. You can check out my blog post on that site here. MR21 (as the interpretation is called) utilized some of the same techniques of 3D mapping in order to accentuate elements of the video interpretation, but with a much stronger focus on storytelling then on spectacle.
So, two very different ways to engage with a repurposed faith building. Both were embedded in historical interpretation, but while one was in its original state, the other utilized more modern methodologies of interpretation.
Which do you prefer as visitors to historic faith sites? Drop me a line and let me know atkendrafry@creativecollisons.org