Stephansdom dynamo

Spiking high over the center of Vienna's Innerstadt is Stephansdom, St. Stephan's cathedral. It towers over everything, and the severe gothic energy easily stuns anyone confronted by it either when emerging from a dark medieval side street or from the U-Bahn vestibule in its open front courtyard. The effect is so explosive that it's difficult to imagine its contrast not with the current modern city, but with the simpler city of 500 years ago (when the cathedral was completed in its current form). It is by that measure easy to understand how the Church could project so much political power back then. The beautiful, spooky and glorious awe almost knocks you to your knees.

The fact that it survived the centuries of fires and wars is another matter; one story involves a retreating German captain in WWII refusing orders to reduce it to a pile of debris. Apparently some symbols of human glory are too special to wipe out in any old world war.