Our Lady Rises Again
The Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris gets new life
On April 15, 2019, this image was being piped out onto TV screens and social media around the world:
From thousands of miles away, I was in a newsroom watching the Notre Dame Cathedral engulfed in flames against a dusk sky in the French capital. Of course, in this day and age anything could have caused it: was it a terror attack, arson or an accident?
I, for one, was in shock. I remembered one of the times I visited back in the summer of 2004, when you could hang out right in front of it, and there was always some busker singing old romantic French songs nearby.
Eventually, we learned that the fire was caused by an accident. And while the structure of the building was intact, the roof was mostly destroyed and the towering spire fell. Luckily, many artefacts were saved.
Immediately after the fire, prominent French businesspeople and organizations donated hundreds of millions of dollars for restoration. Over the past four years, work to rebuild the damaged or destroyed parts of the Gothic Cathedral has been prolific.
More than 1,000 artisans helped painstakingly recreate parts of the cathedral and its embellishments. That includes stone statues that were destroyed and the spire (known as the flèche in French) that towered above it.
Whether walking by at night or by day, the Notre Dame has been shielded by scaffolding for several years as reconstruction has taken place. I can’t tell you how many times I walked past ‘Our Lady’ to see her bandaged up during her healing process.
A bit of history now.
The first stone of the Notre Dame Cathedral was laid in the 12th century, and its construction was completed in the 13th century. Other pieces of it were either worked on or added in the centuries following. One was the spire designed by the architect Eugène Viollet-le-Duc in the 19th century. (I mentioned him in my article about Carcassonne, whose medieval fortress he also lent his hand to.)
For centuries, the cathedral witnessed a number of milestones in French history, like the French Revolution. Also, Napoleon crowned himself as the Emperor of France there in 1804 (humble).
The Notre Dame is so iconic that it became the most visited monument in Paris in the earlier part of this century. Today, if you walk around the outside of the building (which you can do), one side of it has a timeline of efforts to restore it to its former glory.
The plan is to reopen the cathedral to visitors and to hold Mass there in December 2024. (Here’s hoping.)
Before I leave you, here’s an article written just after the fire broke out at the Notre Dame Cathedral, by Al Jazeera journalist (and friend) Stéphane Faure:
'Notre Dame was always watching over me from nursery to university'
Thanks for the update on notre dame!