Flying with God: Most major airports have dedicated chapels

OPINION:

Airports may be harried places. But many house holy places. A meticulous analysis of current FAA data reveals that 60 percent of the nation’s largest airports have chapels, according to Aleksandra Sandstrom, a researcher and editor with the Pew Research Center.

“Travelers often arrive at airports praying that the security lines won’t be too long or that they don’t end up in a middle seat. But at many of the nation’s largest airports, there’s a more spiritual setting for offering up prayers - a chapel,” she writes.

Some have more than one. Consider that Dallas/Fort Worth International Airport has five different interfaith chapels - one in every terminal while New York’s Kennedy International Airport hosts a Catholic church, a Protestant chapel, a mosque and a synagogue.

Of the 30 large airport hubs which handle from 7 million to 45 million passengers a year, 18 of then - 60 percent - maintain chapels or prayer rooms. Most also offer formal services; only four of the nation’s 18 major airports do not offer organized worship.

“Washington Dulles International Airport offers weekly Catholic Mass, Protestant worship and Christian prayer services, as well as daily Jewish and Muslim prayer services,” Ms. Sandstrom says.

So does Ronald Reagan Washington National airport. Los Angles International Air Port is one major hub that has not chapel or prayer room, along with McCarran International Airport in Las Vegas.
The flyer’s chapel has some history, meanwhile. Our Lady of the Airways - the nation’s first - opened at Boston’s Logan International Airport about 60 years ago.

“Since then, airports all over the country have added spaces for prayer, worship and meditation,” the researcher adds.

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