Welcome to the first installment in a series of columns called Building Better Religions. BBR is a series I have been planning since shortly after I started writing this column. I am going to devote each individual column in the series to discussing a specific feature of religious life. Each column will describe that feature and offer some suggestions to customizing it for individual GMs. My goal is to provide a toolkit of suggestions and ideas that will allow GMs to build and run more detailed, in-depth religions. This first column is called Sacred Space. It is about how to better design religious buildings to make them a unique organic product of an in-game religion.

Introductory Notes

In discussing features of real-world religious life, I am going to be doing a bit of over generalizing. I am sure there are exceptions to everything I say about religions, but hopefully these broad examples will help you design and play a more realistic religious life in your game.

Also, all of these columns will be referencing a religious concept called “the sacred.” All religions (and here’s that generalizing) believe that there is a level of reality beyond what we perceive, a realm of gods and demons, the realm of the sacred. Anything that gives worshippers the experience of contact with that realm is itself sacred- a place, a day, an object- it can be anything that is considered specially connected with the religion. Anything sacred to a religion will be designed to promote a transcendent experience, taking the worshipper out of day-to-day life.

Houses of the Holy

Religious settings are a common feature of adventuring. They make good, atmospheric settings for stories of good and evil. However, the design of those religious settings can be remarkably generic. The temptation is to plop down a Gothic cathedral or Greek temple into your world. No matter how imaginative your in-game religion is, a generic house of worship will prevent that imagination from fully being presented to your players.

The basic thing to think about in designing a holy place is the mood. Not just the mood you want to evoke, but the mood the place was built to evoke. Any place of worship will be deliberately designed to evoke a sense of the core sacred emotions and ideas of that religion. The place will be set up to enhance the religious experience of worship. Here are a few other things to think about when designing places of worship to help it be a better individual expression of your imagination.

Basic Religious Background

Why is this place sacred? What about this particular building or land makes it special? Some places of worship are sacred because of the worship. The fact that this is the place where holy rituals are performed is enough to make it a holy place. However, other common reasons a place is worshipped at are that something holy happened there (a saint’s birth, a god’s battle, a famous miracle) or something holy is currently there (holy bones, divine images, sacred trees or springs.)

What is that religion’s attitude toward images? Are there any limits on what can be depicted, or how they can be depicted? Some religions may forbid any images; some may allow depictions of animals or plants, but not people or divine beings. Some may allow everything short of their god’s “physical” form, but will allow them to be represented with symbols. Others might encourage depiction of religious figures and stories. If your religion believes in evil gods or demons, could they be depicted, even to show their defeat?

Architectural Principles

What is the central focus of the act of worship? Is it a holy book, an altar of sacrifice, or a sacred object prayed to for help? Is it a statue of a god or saint? Whatever that central focus is, the rest of the house of worship will be designed to direct attention on it. It will be in the most prominent spot in the room, and the lines of the building will converge on it. A sacred book might be on a raised pulpit against the back wall of a church, or a sacrificial altar might be on the lowest of a series of concentric circles in the center of the floor. All of the little details we associate with religion- candles, incense, and mosaics- will be designed to create a psychological draw to that primary focus. No matter how simple or low-tech your religion is, the space will somehow be set up to focus the worshippers. Even your basic “stone sacrificial altar in a sacred grove” follows this principle.

What are the sacred numbers or shapes of that religion? These are a good easy design guide for a house of worship. If you do not know any specific sacred numbers, any detail of a religion could provide them. If the evil cult that kidnapped the princess worships a four headed dragon, half the design work is already done.

What part of the real world does your religion associate with the spirit world? A religion focused on a celestial heaven might have temples drew the eye upward with points and angles. A religion that focused on an underworld might have temples carved in descending layers deep down into the earth. A religion that believed in an inner quest for transcendent truth might build in the form of a labyrinth or spiral. Some Classical Roman cults believed the universe was hierarchy of levels that their religious enlightenment could take them through. There temples were a series of rooms, each increasingly interior room corresponding to a deeper level of the universe. As they were initiated deeper into the cult, they would be allowed further into the temple. Whatever your religion believes about the universe, their architecture will reflect this.

Form and Function

How do the worshippers worship? Do they sit, do they kneel, do they stand? Do they move around, are there processions? Your house of worship will need to accommodate that worship. Some medieval Catholic cathedral with relics of popular saints would have wide aisles built around the central worship area to allow pilgrims to see the relics during the service.

Also, don’t forget the practical details. The most elaborate temple in the world needs a space to store the ritual robes. What would your religion need to make these religious services work? Storage closets, cleaning supplies, bathrooms, animal pens/ feed storage (if applicable.) Churches are not all altars and crypts- they are functioning buildings. Somewhere in the grand cathedral of the sun god there is a set of ledgers detailing incense expenses for the last ten years.

Designing at Work

Let’s go over the process, building coherent houses of worship using the random fantasy-sounding example I mentioned earlier.

The dark temple of the evil princess-sacrificing cult of the sinister dragon god Gr’aphla’ksx. We know they worship a four headed dragon, so let’s work under the principle that they want to create a sense of majesty and power centered on their sacrificial act. Being a sinister cult, they would need a certain level of concealment, so they have an underground temple with a hidden entrance. Once through the entrance the worshiper descends down a single long corridor carved like scales. This has the double benefit of increasing security and providing the cultist with a sense of leaving their normal world behind and entering the realm of the dragon god. The top of the tunnel exit is shaded, so that when you exit into the main temple the sight hits you all at once.

The main temple is a large square windowless room. The floor is carved in scale patterns, and from each corner a large dragon head arches over the room, meeting in the middle above a raised clawed-hand designed altar platform. This draws the eye and focus of the worshipping cultist to the altar, and creates a sense of actually standing on the dragon. The light is provided by lamps built into the dragon heads. At the climatic moment of sacrifice, acolytes pull red filters down around the lamps, filling the room with red light. Below that central chamber are the mundane features such as closets, a knife washing station and cells to hold the prisoners.

If you know a few basic facts about your religion, and you come up with the right mood to evoke, you can easily design a unique, internally coherent house of worship for your game world.