I am preparing to share a controversial opinion on ecclesiastical architecture

I think the Basilica in DC is lovely and all, but it was the worst possible design that could have been chosen (ignoring most modern styles)

Furthermore, I think Westminster Cathedral (not Westminster Abbey) is literally the absolute worst possible design that could have been chosen

Within the Anglo world, for many, there is a perception of Catholicism as foreign. In truth, this is obviously not the case as for Western Europeans and the descendants of the settlers, Catholicism is in our culture even when we don't realise it. Nonetheless...

the perception of Catholicism as foreign persists. When Catholicism was reintroduced to England after the English Reformation, it was presented as Irish or continental Catholicism, ignoring the history of English Catholicism which in many ways still existed in the CoE

In the US, at least in the South, the oldest church in any town (pre-Civil War town) is the Episcopal Church. Same church that most of the founders were associated with and most of the prominent men from the South and much of the North.

Episcopal (and by extension Methodist) architecture is really just English Catholic architecture. It is beautiful, but more importantly, there is a feeling of familiarity about it. Every town has a nice Episcopal or Methodist church that everyone gets married in

So anyways, Catholicism has this flair of foreign about it. Catholics want to build a nice Cathedral in London and DC as they make inroads back into the Anglo world, and what design styles do they choose? The familiar and Catholic English gothic styles? French gothic?

Nah, they choose fucking Byzantine styles. Byzantine architecture is rad, but you know what else it is? Foreign. Literally like 100 people in DC have been to Constantinople, and maybe 80 of them have Greek Ortho ancestry