You can find all kinds of things to do at an airport besides waiting at your gate. Most airports are equipped with restaurants, amazing retail options, and some even have museums and gigantic slides.
But one thing that only a few airports have in the U.S. are chapels.
These overlooked spaces are often set up today as places for meditation, rather than worship for a single faith, and they’ve played an interesting role in the history of airports.
According to Smithsonian Magazine, airport chapels weren’t all that common until the 1950’s and 1960’s — mostly due to Catholic leaders in the community.
Our Lady of the Airways Chapel at Boston Logan airport. Alexander Farnsworth/Getty Images
The very first airport chapel in the U.S. was Our Lady of the Airways at Logan International Airport in Boston, according to Smithsonian Magazine. It was built in 1951 by Boston Archbishop Richard J. Cushing, but it wasn’t a space for passengers to say a few rosaries before getting on their flights.
Instead, Our Lady of the Airways was almost exclusively for airport staff so they could attend mass, even while working. The second chapel, Our Lady of the Skies at John F. Kennedy International Airport (at the time it was called Idlewild), was built in 1955, according to the chapel website. A Jewish synagogue was also built shortly after, Smithsonian Magazine reported.
The non-denominational chapel offers a quiet refuge at Denver International Airport on August 30, 2007. Glenn Asakawa/The Denver Post via Getty Images
Like Logan, the JFK chapel was distant from terminals, making it more of a staff chapel. Passengers could use them, but they weren’t very convenient. Since then, Our Lady of the Skies at JFK has been moved to Terminal 4 so it can better serve employees and passengers. According to the chapel’s website, it serves “70 million passengers and about 50,000 employees.”
But you won’t find chapels in every airport you go to. The reasons for this is based around airport and city rules and demographics of the airport in particular. For instance, at Chicago O’Hare International Airport, impromptu religious gatherings are not allowed on airport grounds, according to Smithsonian Magazine. Other airports have very specific rules about chapels and religious gatherings — and no two airports are alike. According to Smithsonian Magazine, four of the nation’s larger airports do not have chapels: Las Vegas, Los Angeles, Philadelphia and New York’s LaGuardia.
Getty Images/iStockphoto
Since the 1950’s, a lot of airport chapels have also undergone a transformation into more inclusive spaces for people of all religious backgrounds. Depending on where you go, some chapels may be multi-denominational spaces with iconography for all major world religions, such as at Charlotte Douglas International Airport, Smithsonian Magazine reported. Others are kept very neutral, with no specific symbols to account for all faiths.
Whether or not your local airport has a chapel completely depends on the community’s history. While some have decided having a chapel is inappropriate at airports, others have seen a need to provide these services.
You can find all kinds of things to do at an airport besides waiting at your gate. Most airports are equipped with restaurants, amazing retail options, and some even have museums and gigantic slides.
But one thing that only a few airports have in the U.S. are chapels.
These overlooked spaces are often set up today as places for meditation, rather than worship for a single faith, and they’ve played an interesting role in the history of airports.
According to Smithsonian Magazine, airport chapels weren’t all that common until the 1950’s and 1960’s — mostly due to Catholic leaders in the community.
The very first airport chapel in the U.S. was Our Lady of the Airways at Logan International Airport in Boston, according to Smithsonian Magazine. It was built in 1951 by Boston Archbishop Richard J. Cushing, but it wasn’t a space for passengers to say a few rosaries before getting on their flights.
Instead, Our Lady of the Airways was almost exclusively for airport staff so they could attend mass, even while working. The second chapel, Our Lady of the Skies at John F. Kennedy International Airport (at the time it was called Idlewild), was built in 1955, according to the chapel website. A Jewish synagogue was also built shortly after, Smithsonian Magazine reported.
Like Logan, the JFK chapel was distant from terminals, making it more of a staff chapel. Passengers could use them, but they weren’t very convenient. Since then, Our Lady of the Skies at JFK has been moved to Terminal 4 so it can better serve employees and passengers. According to the chapel’s website, it serves “70 million passengers and about 50,000 employees.”
But you won’t find chapels in every airport you go to. The reasons for this is based around airport and city rules and demographics of the airport in particular. For instance, at Chicago O’Hare International Airport, impromptu religious gatherings are not allowed on airport grounds, according to Smithsonian Magazine. Other airports have very specific rules about chapels and religious gatherings — and no two airports are alike. According to Smithsonian Magazine, four of the nation’s larger airports do not have chapels: Las Vegas, Los Angeles, Philadelphia and New York’s LaGuardia.
Since the 1950’s, a lot of airport chapels have also undergone a transformation into more inclusive spaces for people of all religious backgrounds. Depending on where you go, some chapels may be multi-denominational spaces with iconography for all major world religions, such as at Charlotte Douglas International Airport, Smithsonian Magazine reported. Others are kept very neutral, with no specific symbols to account for all faiths.
Whether or not your local airport has a chapel completely depends on the community’s history. While some have decided having a chapel is inappropriate at airports, others have seen a need to provide these services.
