Recently I was lucky enough to be able to attend Meeting for Worship at Live Oak Friends Meeting in Houston, Texas.

On a still, calm, warm morning, the simple ‘early’ Meeting was profoundly quiet. The sounds of birdsong from the surrounding trees and gardens were woven through by the haunting low chord that American trains sound as they pass. I was made welcome by a group of Friends who were there ahead of a busy day of further worship, discussion and shared lunch. What was particularly special was the opportunity to experience the only Meeting house that has an integral work of art by James Turrell. His installations are known the world over. Many – such as the ‘skyspace’ in the Yorkshire Sculpture Park – have relatively explicit resonances with Meeting houses that reflect Turrell’s Quaker upbringing and outlook.

His work in general also brings a transcendent sense of emerging or shared light, both as a real experience and as a rich metaphor. Live Oak Meeting House turns this round. Its status as the home of an active Local Meeting allows an extraordinary sense of worship and community within a work of art which grows from the very centre of the tradition it houses.

In Houston, it is also possible to visit the ‘Rothko Chapel’. It was created to fulfil the ambition of painter Mark Rothko for a space in which the transformative potential of his art might be fully expressed. Its founding patron, Dominique de Menil, described it as ‘a place blessed the many people who gather there to meditate, to find themselves, and to go beyond themselves. It is a place that was solemnly dedicated to love, to God, to the absolute truth you seek.’

In the plain entrance a well-used row of books and sacred texts drawn from the great faiths sit among carefully chosen texts about spiritual life. This detail reaffirms the openness of Rothko’s art and de Menil’s ambition. While it is a place for quiet reflection for individuals, many different groups, large and small, well-known and ‘ordinary’, use the Chapel. I was able to join a small group from the Magdalen Community, a gathering who explore different spiritualities and faith traditions through conversation, dialogue and reflection. In turn this drew my attention to the Charter for Compassion, and the meetings held in the Chapel to promote discussion of it.

These two places are wonderful examples of art for spiritual purpose in living places.