Place of worship

A place of worship is a specially designed structure or space where individuals or a group of people such as a congregation come to perform acts of devotion, veneration, or religious study. A building constructed or used for this purpose is sometimes called a house of worship. Temples, churches, mosques, and synagogues are examples of structures created for worship. A monastery may serve both to house those belonging to religious orders and as a place of worship for visitors. Natural or topographical features may also serve as places of worship, and are considered holy or sacrosanct in some religions; the rituals associated with the Ganges river are an example in Hinduism. Under International Humanitarian Law and the Geneva Conventions, religious buildings are offered special protection, similar to the protection guaranteed hospitals displaying the Red Cross or Red Crescent. These international laws of war bar firing upon or from a religious building. Religious architecture expresses the religious beliefs, aesthetic choices, and economic and technological capacity of those who create or adapt it, and thus places of worship show great variety depending on time and place. Buddhist temple List of Buddhist temples Candi, Buddhist sanctuaries mostly built during the 1st to 21st centuries in the Indonesian Archipelago Chaitya, a Buddhist shrine that includes a stupa Jingū-ji, a religious complex in pre-Meiji Japan comprising a Buddhist temple and a local kami Shinto shrine Pagoda, a towerlike, multistory structure usually associated with Buddhist temple complexes of East and Southeast Asia. Vihara, a Buddhist monastery found abundantly in Bihar Wat, the name for a monastery temple in Cambodia and Thailand Church (building) List of churches The word church derives from the Greek ekklesia, meaning the called-out ones. Its original meaning is to refer to the body of believers, or the body of Christ. The word church is used to refer to a Christian place of worship by some Christian denominations, including Anglicans and Catholics.

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Related concepts (28)

Place of worship

Shrine

A shrine (scrinium "case or chest for books or papers"; Old French: escrin "box or case") is a sacred or holy space dedicated to a specific deity, ancestor, hero, martyr, saint, daemon, or similar figure of respect, wherein they are venerated or worshipped. Shrines often contain s, relics, or other such objects associated with the figure being venerated. A shrine at which votive offerings are made is called an altar.

Temple

A temple (from the Latin templum) is a building reserved for spiritual rituals and activities such as prayer and sacrifice. Religions which erect temples include Christianity (whose temples are typically called churches), Hinduism, Buddhism, Sikhism (whose temples are called gurudwara), Jainism (whose temples are sometimes called derasar), Islam (whose temples are called mosques), Judaism (whose temples are called synagogues), Zoroastrianism (whose temples are sometimes called Agiary), the Baha'i Faith (which are often simply referred to as Baha'i House of Worship), Taoism (which are sometimes called Daoguan), Shinto (which are sometimes called Jinja), Confucianism (which are sometimes called the Temple of Confucius), and ancient religions such as the Ancient Egyptian religion and the Ancient Greek religion.