Michael Aldag: Temple and the Vanishing Congregation
Among Aldag’s most significant projects is Temple, an ongoing photographic series centered on former church properties in Southern Illinois. These are buildings once used by Christian congregations for regular worship but no longer serving that purpose. Some stand empty. Some have been adapted for entirely new functions. Others remain intact yet disconnected from their original role. Aldag has photographed more than sixty such sites across numerous towns in this Bible Belt region, creating a visual archive of changing religious landscapes. The project is not limited to nostalgia or preservation. Instead, it invites viewers to consider what happens when places built for collective faith become uncertain, commercialized, abandoned, or transformed. Every façade, tower, and doorway suggests another chapter in the story of American civic life. Because churches often functioned as neighborhood anchors, their decline can reflect shifts in economics, migration, demographics, and identity. Temple therefore operates simultaneously as art, record, and cultural inquiry.
The statistics surrounding religious affiliation in the United States sharpen the significance of the series. In 1937, Gallup reported that 73 percent of U.S. adults belonged to a church, synagogue, or mosque. By 2020, that figure had fallen to 47 percent. Research from Pew in 2024 found that roughly 28 percent of adults identified as religiously unaffiliated, describing themselves as atheist, agnostic, or nothing in particular. Pew also noted that while about 90 percent of adults identified as Christian in the early 1990s, the figure is now closer to two-thirds. Aldag does not need to preach these numbers. He shows their visible consequences through streetscapes and structures. Closed sanctuaries, neglected masonry, and repurposed fellowship halls become material evidence of broad social transition. The data and the photographs reinforce one another, allowing viewers to see how national trends settle into local streets and everyday environments.
The title Temple carries special force because it suggests reverence while also acknowledging fragility. Many of the photographed buildings were designed to inspire permanence through stone walls, bell towers, stained glass, and formal entrances. Yet permanence is never guaranteed. Congregations shrink, maintenance costs rise, neighborhoods change, and ownership shifts. Aldag’s images reveal how grand intentions can meet practical realities. Some former churches become residences, schools, or businesses, extending the life of the structure in new ways. Others decline slowly under weather and neglect. Neither outcome is presented with cheap sentimentality. Instead, he allows viewers to wrestle with mixed emotions: admiration for craftsmanship, sadness for loss, curiosity about reuse, and reflection on what communities choose to sustain. In this sense, Temple is less about endings than transformation. It asks whether sacred meaning disappears when a building changes purpose, or whether traces of it remain in stone, light, and memory.
