Sacraments in neon with Aura at Grace Cathedral

By Lou Pizante, The Experientialists

Grace Cathedral is not the sort of place you expect to be politely mugged by transcendence. Yet that’s exactly what happens in Aura, the latest chapter in Moment Factory’s series of cathedral-based multimedia works, co-presented here with Fever.

The Montreal studio—already known for turning airports, arenas, and forests into sites of light-driven wonder—has now set its sights on San Francisco’s great Gothic revival landmark. The result is equal parts hymn, hallucination, and cultural survival strategy.

Aura began in Montreal at the Basilica of Notre-Dame in 2017, where clergy and light art creatives conspired to reintroduce the basilica’s architecture to a city that had stopped noticing it. The concept spread to Paris, where the Dôme des Invalides shimmered under storms of light and orchestral thunder above Napoléon’s tomb.

Now San Francisco has its turn: Grace Cathedral, with its stained glass, ribbed vaults, and vaulted nave, becomes a 21st-century canvas for projection mapping, surround sound, and architectural storytelling. The conceit is deceptively simple: let the building itself become the protagonist, rediscovered through light and music.

Moment Factory

The experience itself unfurls like a liturgy rewritten in pixels. Storms ripple across the ribs of the nave. Gardens bloom overhead. Starfields drift through the stained glass until the windows seem to exhale. Columns ignite into pillars of fire, shadows conspire with the choreography, and constellations pause mid-air as though the universe were waiting for you to catch up.

It’s less “sit politely and observe” and more “stand astonished while architecture reveals it has a nightlife.”

By partnering with Moment Factory, Grace Cathedral isn’t converting into a nightclub for angels; it’s creating a new form of ministry—one that meets a generation on its own terms, speaking fluently in light and pixels. It is a liturgy for an age that wants its worship written in wavelengths. And here, wonder is not a gimmick or distraction—it’s the sermon.

Aura: why would a church do this?

Because heritage spaces everywhere are facing a common dilemma: declining attendance, shrinking budgets, and the urgent need to stay relevant without betraying their spiritual mandate. By reframing themselves as sites of art and wonder, they draw in audiences who might never arrive for Sunday services but are still seeking meaning.

For clergy and congregations, Aura is not about renting out sacred space—it’s about rediscovering their role as cultural centers, inviting the public to engage with awe in new forms.

“By including Aura in Grace Cathedral, we’re not just illuminating our building, we’re inviting San Francisco to see one of its most beloved landmarks in a completely new light,” says The Very Rev. Dr Malcolm Clemens Young, Dean of Grace Cathedral. “This city is known for innovation and artistry, and bringing this experience here feels like the perfect way to celebrate both."

Moment Factory

Of course, this isn’t just about keeping the lights on—though ironically, that’s exactly what they’re doing. What’s really at stake is the definition of worship in the 21st century. Is it only pews and prayer books, or can a city’s encounter with light and sound also count as devotion? If awe is the common denominator, then perhaps the sermon has already moved into pixels.

The question isn’t whether the church has sold out, but whether the language of the sacred now speaks in light.

And Grace Cathedral is hardly alone. From Madrid to Liverpool to Rhode Island, projection has become the new incense. Banijay’s newly acquired Lotchi has been filling churches with light under its Luminiscence banner. Liverpool’s Old Christ Church has already gone cosmic with projection and lasers, and MASARY Studios has turned Rhode Island’s Grace Church into a glowing choral theatre.

Technology alone is never the differentiator

For the experiential field, Aura—and the wave of other cathedral projects now set aglow—is a reminder that technology alone is never the differentiator.

Plenty of venues can throw projection at a wall. What makes this compelling is context: the collision of sacred architecture and spectacle, the discipline of telling the building’s story rather than decorating it, and the willingness of institutions to say, “Yes, we can use immersive tools without losing our soul.”

Moment Factory

That’s theory on paper, but in practice it arrives as a sensation rather than a sentence, as a moment that lingers. The cathedral doesn’t just shine, it sings—making your skin hum like a tuning fork you didn’t know you were carrying. By the finale, you feel the entire building breathing with you; applause feels absurd, because clapping would be too small for something that just rewired your insides.

The experience is half-prayer, half-laser show, and somehow manages to convince you that both are valid ways of talking to the divine. Walking out, you don’t wonder whether you believe—you wonder how you ever thought light was just for seeing, when it clearly has plans to save you.

This article is part of an ongoing exploration of the evolving immersive landscape—how we lost our way, who’s fighting to bring meaning back, and why it matters. For more on what this column is all about, start with Is This Article Immersive?, where I lay out the mission: reclaiming immersion from the gimmick merchants and giving it back to those who create experiences worth disappearing into.