April 15,
2019, is a sad day. Not only are taxes due today, but word came that the Notre Dame Cathedral caught fire.
May 31, 1993, I visited the Notre Dame Cathedral - a most
beautiful structure. The circle of stained glass in front was so magical and
spectacular.
Dave Box and I walked up the spiral stairs (I tried every door
on the way up!), and went to the top where we got to go inside the bell that
Quasimodo "rang" and saw the 'thinking gargoyle.'
While up there, we noticed our whole group leaving and they were
gone by the time we were in the plaza; but, the trip through the cathedral was
a definite sight to see.
Now, I wish I had a modern camera and not my little Kodak 110
camera to get more photos of it to document it.
My journal entry that day says:
We (then)
went to Quasimodo's Notre Dame Cathedral. It cost 20 F, and I went up the
tower, Dave following, and I had an up-close and personal encounter with a
gargoyle! The sculpture of this thing was SO neat! The people from near the top
were so small, yet, looking in the distance, we still weren't as high today as
we were on the Eiffel Tower yesterday! Then I saw a group of people going into
a wooden door. I followed. We went to the grand bell - the one that Quasimodo
is supposed to have rung. The, I went up some more stairs and got to the very,
very TOP of the cathedral! Still not as high as I was on the Eiffel. I climbed
down and went outside (into the plaza).
I
turned in an essay on June 17, 1993, which also documented the visit to the
cathedral in "Perspectives on European Culture and Arts":
...we
went to Quasimodo, the Hunchback of Notre Dame's Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris.
Dave and I climbed up hundreds of stairs to get to the top where I had a
close-up encounter with the Thinking Gargoyle. Net, we were led by a group of
people into a room which contained the thousand-some-odd-ton bell, the Grande
Bell, that Hunchy was supposed to have rang. From atop the cathedral, you could
see the L'arc de Triomphe and the new Grand Arch.
Such a sad day that this gorgeous structure is burned. I
cannot imagine the heartbreak the people of Paris are feeling today as this
great structure built in 1163 and completed in the 13th Century has burned up in 2019, 856 years' worth of people,
sermons, sight seeing, wars, revolutions, and more history suffered this damage.
I pray for the health and well-being of the firefighters and emergency personnel, the congregation of the church and the people of Paris. This is sad.
There is already talk of donations, and repairs that could take several decades. I won't get to see it returned to its splendor in my lifetime, but hopefully it'll look like it has before and will be there for today's kids to see one day.
I pray for the health and well-being of the firefighters and emergency personnel, the congregation of the church and the people of Paris. This is sad.
There is already talk of donations, and repairs that could take several decades. I won't get to see it returned to its splendor in my lifetime, but hopefully it'll look like it has before and will be there for today's kids to see one day.
The church's official website is: http://www.notredamedeparis.fr/en/
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