Notre-Dame de Paris: When the Threat Comes From Within

A doctor by training, Mgr. Michel Aupetit seems to believe in his hidden talents as an architect: according to information from Figaro, in its edition of November 19, 2020, relayed by La Croix and Valeurs Actuelles, the Archbishop of Paris has assembled a think tank made up of members of the clergy, but also specialists in train station layout or public reception.

The future project might contain - we still have to write in the conditional - two parts: the first, aimed at better managing the reception of the twelve million visitors who cross the threshold of the cathedral each year, would consist mostly in planning for cloak rooms and more suitable water sources.

The second part risks provoking controversy since new contemporary stained-glass windows could be installed in order to increase the light and add color: enough to pose serious questions for anyone who knows anything about it, in gothic art ...

But the archbishop would also like to renew the furniture. Exit the traditional wooden and straw chairs and make way for benches of a refined design, equipped with light spots.

This new arrangement, shown on digital models that Le Figaro was able to see, would give “an impression of an airport runway, or even a parking lot”... Bossuet and Lacordaire could not have dreamed of better for their sermons at Notre-Dame: how long before a blinking pulpit?

“Nothing has been decided yet,” protested the archdiocese, where they were determined to “play their part” - to use Le Figaro’s expression - in order to bring the project to fruition.

“We are keen on the articulation of worship and culture,” explains one of the members of the reflection committee on the reconfiguration of the building, Fr. Gilles Drouin.

While it is true that the centuries always have their small part in the great monuments that are rearranged or repaired out of necessity, we can nevertheless fear the worst for Notre-Dame. On the one hand, because the liturgical principles transformed by Vatican II are radically incompatible with the great liturgical tradition with which the great vessel of the Ile de la Cité is shaped.

And furthermore because contemporary artists for the most part have nothing in common - even if they cannot be blame for it - with all those who built the cathedrals and maintained them. They don't have that faith that turned itself to adoration and prayer in stone. So yes, there is a lot to worry about.