Front Royal, Virginia — The Cathedral of Notre Dame de Paris was not totally burned down. It will be restored, rebuilt, repaired, fixed, or something like that. The unanswered question is: Will it come out of the process as a cathedral or a patched-up victim?

This is the paradox of Paris; it is the best of Christian cities, it is the worst of Christian cities.

We still believe that Notre Dame is not just a building. It is something more important. I remember going to at least two early weekday Latin Masses there (after Latin had become rare) with my mother, about a dozen old ladies, and a gentleman in a big hat wearing riding boots and spurs. Later in the day thousands would come to the Cathedral, but only because it was a beautiful building. This is the paradox of Paris; it is the best of Christian cities, it is the worst of Christian cities. Is Paris the gentleman in spurs or the member of the French Parliament who is elected on an “anti-clerical” platform?

The people of Paris, a little more than 200 years ago, put the statue of “Reason” on the high altar of Notre Dame and turned the building into a pagan temple.

The people of Paris, a little more than 200 years ago, put the statue of “Reason” on the high altar of Notre Dame and turned the building into a pagan temple. About the same time, they martyred most of the clergy of the City of Paris. The blood of martyrs waters the Church, but it does not water people as long as they still persist in celebrating the killers of martyrs as models of patriotism.

A beautiful altar at Notre Dame depicting Our Lady at the Crucifixion and burial of Our Lord
Photo by Fran Griffin

The magnificent (former) ceiling of Notre Dame; and the gigantic rose window (which has survived the fire)
Photo by Fran Griffin

“Saint Thomas Aquinas, Fountain of Wisdom” by Antoine Nicolas, painter (1648), one of the many magnificent paintings in the cathedral
Photo by Fran Griffin

The blood of martyrs is still there to water Paris, but it will not do so as long as official and Paris-run France persists in glorifying Bastille Day, the Tricolor, “Liberty, Fraternity, Equality” and the Marseilles as national symbols, not as symbols of the Terror.

There will be a new roof on Notre Dame, a more fireproof one and therefore a better one. I doubt that there are many artisans today with the Medieval patience to build things that are unlikely to be finished in their lifetimes. Notre Dame was built over many generations by artisans who knew that their souls were eternal (and therefore capable of seeing the end product). Many Parisians today deny that the soul survives the death of the body.

It is not inherently wrong to add contemporary things to buildings that are five hundred or a thousand years old. Buildings are not fossils. It was not wrong to turn the Pantheon into a church. It is wrong to add things that mock God to buildings built to glorify God.

The blood of martyrs is still there to water Paris, but it will not do so as long as official and Paris-run France persists in glorifying Bastille Day, the Tricolor, “Liberty, Fraternity, Equality” and the Marseilles as national symbols, not as symbols of the Terror.

The challenge to those who repair Notre Dame is as difficult as that faced by an emergency room doctor after a horrible automobile accident. If they do too little Notre Dame, will emerge as a badly bandaged patient or an archaeological site. If they add anti-Christian elements it will emerge as an act of desecration or an example of incompetence. If they add trite minimalist or Bauhaus elements, they will be remembered as inept and these elements will be hated by sensible people.

The revival of Notre Dame must be accomplished entirely by people who realize that they are working on a product of the Age of Faith, not the cynicism of the Republic of France.

The revival of Notre Dame must be accomplished entirely by people who thoroughly understand that this is a place in which Jesus actually comes down on the altar, Body and Blood, Soul and Divinity, and who realize that they are working on a product of the Age of Faith, not the cynicism of the Republic of France.

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Copyright © 2019 by the Fitzgerald Griffin Foundation. All rights reserved. This article may be reprinted if credit is given to Charles G. Mills and fgfBooks.com.

Charles G. Mills, author of The Confederate Lawyer, is the Judge Advocate Emeritus (general counsel) for the New York State American Legion. As a New York lawyer, he has been arguing cases for fifty years in federal courts and in all levels of the New York courts.

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