Despite growing up religious I seldom found myself in physical religious spaces, going to temple only a handful of times each year for the High Holy Days. Since coming to Romania I have found myself spending vastly more time surrounded by religion, bringing these spaces to the front of my mind. In both Wallachia and Transylvania, two very distinct regions, religion is central to shaping the physicality of cities, with the churches of different sects scattered all over the landscape. The variety of different churches tell a story of the importance physical religious spaces have for communities and individuals. On the community level, these religious spaces operate as symbolic visual representations of the strength and importance of the church, and give important spaces for communities to gather. For individuals they operate as a way to step into religion while distinctly separated from the outside world.
In Cluj-Napoca the symbolic importance of religion to creating identity is seen by the presence of Catholic, Greek Catholic, and Orthodox churches which are scattered all across the city. Transylvania is home to a wide variety of sects, and each presents their importance to the larger community through churches which give strong visual representations of power. Walking through Cluj the structures physically impose religion onto people, working to create an identity for Romanian’s based in part around religion. While the role of churches in being visual representations of identity is important, they are also central spaces for people to gather. On Easter I went to New St. George church with a group of other students and it was by far the largest religious gathering I have ever been to. Being in this space and the community as they shared an important moment together I was able to feel the importance of the physical space despite hardly understanding the religious ceremony.
Alongside the importance to communities, witnessing individuals in church at all times throughout the week has been a completely new experience for me. Only being in a temple on religious holidays I rarely considered it a place of daily reflection to connect with my religion and never really considered going on my own. In Sibiu I found this view most explicitly challenged. Entering a small Orthodox church, I wandered around looking at icons, suddenly I nearly tripped over a kneeling woman. After this I slowed down and took one of the few seats in the church and considered how nice it must be to settle into a religious space on your own and to practice without others around you. This level of individual peace while practicing religion is something I have never had in my own life, and even though it is not my religion I am beginning to feel at peace in these holy spaces.
I was initially intimidated by the physical presence of religion around Romania, feeling disconnected from my own religion in the presence of so many churches both Orthodox and
Catholic. Walking around I initially viewed these churches as ways to create a shared identity that I would never be a part of. However, as I have spent more time in the churches, both in the presence of others and on my own, I am beginning to see their importance in terms of communal spaces and as places for individual worship in addition to creating identity. The importance of individual worship has been particularly interesting to me. Due to both my own choices and the distance to my temple, I never experienced this ability to physically separate and practice religion on my own, and I am finding it to be a cathartic experience even outside of my own religion. As I spend more time in the Balkans I hope to continue spending time in religious spaces and think about their role in creating identity, while enjoying the holy place to practice they provide on an individual level.