From Roman Temple to Baptist Church: Sin and Transformation in Southern Baptist Culture

Abstract

abstract:In 1958, the Vestavia Hills Baptist Church transformed a faux-Roman temple house (built in 1925) outside of Birmingham, Alabama, into a space appropriate for Baptist worship. Yet Vestavia's decades-long history of pagan worship, dancing, and drinking stood in direct conflict with Southern Baptist beliefs and cultural practices. This article considers an unusual example of ecclesiastical adaptive reuse to argue that Vestavia's pagan and entertaining past brought Baptist views on sin into sharp relief. Vestavia Hills Baptist Church also crafted a narrative centered on the building's transformation from pagan temple to Christian church to place the new congregation within a much longer Christian heritage.