Tulsa is Beautiful! Except...

When I returned from lovely Tulsa, I spent a bit of time catching up on news on the net and had to laugh at Andrew Sullivan's post on "Butt Ugly Churches" because the Great Uncles live near Oral Roberts University.  Oh my God, I've never seen such a bizarre place.  Google "Oral Roberts University" and hit images, but you might want to do it at home because I'm not sure such bad taste is safe for work.  It's built in a 60s space age, Jetsons-meet-Jesus style of architecture that made me think some hack architect must have shown Oral the designs as a joke and been stunned that he chose them.  Then he laughed all the way to the bank. 

You enter the University through these gigantic praying hands.  They are Oral's hands, of course, not Gods and not the hands from the famous Durer painting. Then, you're assaulted by an explosion of gold glass, jutting angles and jarring shapes.  This place makes the Seattle Space Needle look positively Victorian.  Think Disney's Tomorrow Land without the tasteful restraint. 

It is so worth a visit.

UPDATE:  I understand that the tall building at top is no longer part of ORU.  Oral built it because God told him to and the city fathers tried to stop it.  It's a low rise part of town and that gold tower is jarring.  Oral would not be deterred because he was on a mission from God.  I guess the Lord works in mysterious ways because Oral went bankrupt building it and had to sell it.  It now belongs to some other outfit, and remains largely empty.  But, it's right across the street from the rest of the campus and is clearly of the same architectural style.