The Faroe Islands are a group of eighteen islands where sheep outnumber people and are located halfway between Iceland and Scotland. These isolated islands are part of the Kingdom of Denmark and have been self-ruling since 1948. The first settlers were from Ireland and then the Vikings arrived around 700 AD.  It is an extreme, almost inhospitable, place to live. It is nicknamed The Land of Maybe.  Because you may be able to do what you had planned, depending on the weather.

It rained the first two days with wind gusts of 40 mph. The house shook and creaked all night. We got out a bit the next day, including a hike where we were wind-battered and soaked. But as every photographer knows stormy skies make dynamic photographs! I visited during the long summer solstice days and it was never dark, just a few hours of twilight.

I have been very fortunate to visit some of the world’s most well-known sacred places.  I attended mass a Notre Dame, photographed a Monk’s lunch in Cambodia, viewed the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel, gawked at the garish gold alter of Seville Cathedral, toured the Córdoba Mosque, and stood in awe of Stonehenge. The place that I felt closest to God was inside a simple church in the Faroe Islands. 

There are sixty-two churches on the Islands mostly The Faroese People’s Church, a national church with a theology similar to the Lutherans.  Even small villages with less than a hundred inhabitants will have a wooden Kirkja sometimes with a sod roof, located on the water’s edge so that sailors and sea drifters can see them from the sea.  The interiors of the churches are small, and spartan with wooden benches and a shelf holding a dozen or so hymnals.  The altarpieces are plain with a simple wooden cross and a hand-crafted altar cloth.  Boats, ships, and rough seas are commonly portrayed in the church decor.  The church is where the residents turn to God for guidance during their recurring struggles with nature.  The adjoining graveyards are blanketed with wildflowers and are a very peaceful and restful place.

Why did I visit these forsaken islands in the middle of the Atlantic a few hundred miles from the Arctic Circle? I am drawn to remoteness and expansive vistas where you can see forever. Be it these remote islands or beaches of Exuma, the Moroccan desert, foggy mornings in the Smoky Mountains, or the savannahs of Africa - they all inspire me.ctures