All across the country, these former houses of worship now sit empty. As I lean back beneath the crumbling ceilings, behind altars covered in dust, all I can wonder about is the life it must have seen. How many people must have spent so many days inside, walked the aisles or were even wed here?

I’m always taken away by the architecture of old churches. There used to be so much thought and work put into the sculpting of these beautiful designs

As we stood static beneath the crumbling mural of the apse, a cold wind fluttered in through the openings surrounding us. Where once stained glass was held in place now remain bare frames circling the upper walls, pouring chilled air into the desolate chapel, and down towards the altar like waterfalls into a small oasis. The fluttering of birds fills the space high above the altar, and even higher up through the towers that remain, slowly collapsing in the chapels front.

This church was completed in 1933 to serve a part of Cleveland’s  Carpatho-Rusyn population. Come the 17th century, they had now become part of the Catholic Church. In the late 1800’s, many Rusyns came to Cleveland, and had established many ornate Byzantine Catholic Churches throughout the area.

The St. Joseph Byzantine Rite Catholic Church will sit abandoned on its 80th birthday as it has spent half of this life in ruin. For the past 40 years, rain, wind, snow, and time have begun to paint over the beautiful murals throughout the structure. Summers burn through into autumn; while in the same way, autumn falls to winter. Some of the murals have been faded by the rain, as others have fallen to the floor, crumbling with the passing of time; ceilings caving to the weight of heavy snowfall, and strong winds of winter.

A beautiful red-bricked facade showcases the St. Peter and St. Paul Catholic Church, topped with incredibly tall, narrow bell towers reaching towards the sky. These architecturally superb steeples tower over us like giants as we stand beneath the entrance to this Neo-gothic masterpiece. Built around 1890 as a German Roman Catholic church, it housed (and still houses) one of the largest organs of its kind in the country. Above this organ, the wall is fitted with an alluring rose window filled with captivating color. The church was rebuilt after a fire in1909 with some interesting cement over the red brick. As we journey through time to 1964, we find that famous actress Susan Hayward and her husband were baptized under the apse of this chapel. A multicolored brick school house resides in the back lot, and atop the floors of that sits a large gymnasium. Parts of the famous movie, “Dogma” were filmed outside the front of this church.

I continue to find more churches throughout my explorations. While some sit in ruin, others remain practically untouched, other than at times only by nature and time itself. Below, I will share with you many other abandoned churches across the country.

These structures will continue to crumble beneath the pressure of destructive elements as long as we let them sit uncared for. Temples will become tossed to the hands of Mother Nature, and sanctuaries will sink into the Earth as she consumes the beauty we have left behind.