While on a month-long sabbatical from pastoral ministry, my wife and I spent the first week resting and recharging in the Dolomites of northern Italy. Having been a pastor for over 45 years and a photographer for half of that time, I was especially fascinated by the landscapes of the Dolomites, which included iconic churches accentuating the majestic mountains. We walked around and explored most of the churches.
At the Church of St. John in the Val de Funes, I didn’t even go to the village, walk across the field, or enter the church. We were running a bit short on time, so I parked along the narrow road that led to the village of Ranui and scrambled up a very steep embankment to reach a vantage point. For this image, I removed my 14-24mm wide-angle lens and put on a longer lens, zooming to 60mm to crop out the village and isolate the church in the valley below.
I then waited until all the people walking on the path through the field had either returned to the village or gone inside the church. It was a picture-perfect moment to press the shutter. This was the only church of the many that I captured that week in the Dolomites where I didn’t walk around the building or inside to get close-ups. It has become my favorite capture of the churches in the Dolomites.
This image reminds me that humans design and build churches to connect with God, but all are small in comparison to the majesty of what God designs and creates.
