By Dylan Chryst Watkiss
Shockwaves radiated through the world and the St. Lawrence community after the Notre-Dame de Paris Cathedral caught fire late last week. Faculty and students mourn the damage to what is described by some as “the world’s church.”
Built more than 800 years ago, the gothic cathedral in the center of Paris is visited by millions every year. It comes as no surprise that many people have been affected by the fire and the extensive damage to the iconic building. A Bordeaux resident and foreign exchange student at St. Lawrence, Mathilde Perrault ‘21, was surprised when she first heard about the blaze. “I was super shocked because that’s something that couldn’t happen,” she said. “Notre-Dame has very special meaning to us, even if it’s something that we don’t like think about everyday, it’s something which is part of us.”
Perrault says that the cathedral has a special place in everyone’s heart, whether they are religious or not. “Whether we are believers or non-believers, like I’m an atheist and most other people in France are as well, but it’s like the history behind the place, and I think it’s very meaningful to all of us,” she said. “It’s like having lost someone from our family.”
Judith DeGroat, a French historian who is also an associate professor of History at St. Lawrence, said the Notre-Dame fire has made her consider the deeper meaning of churches. “It made me think, what’s the place of a church, as a non-believer, you know, in our society? It’s not just a place you go for your Sunday service, but it has these cultural meanings,” she said.
Looking at the fire from a historian’s perspective, DeGroat believes this is a part of history and it allows for a fresh start. “There is this loss of history, a loss of symbol, but then there is also this kind of renewal,” DeGroat said.
Jethro Dede ‘19, from Marseille, France, was also shaken by the news of the fire. “I was like no way this can’t be happening in the center Catholic Church in France that has survived two world wars. It was definitely shocking,” Dede said.
Yesim Bayar, assistant professor of Sociology at St. Lawrence, was also distressed and saddened by the news. She described the fire at Notre-Dame as a “loss to humanity.” Bayar believes Notre-Dame is a symbol of stability and comfort in the world. “There’s a sense of comfort that you’re in the world with these things that have been there before you and that will be there after you, kind of thing, that continuity is sort of destroyed when something like that is lost, and with that your sense of comfort and stability in this world is perhaps a little bit damaged,” she said.
The president of France has said that the Cathedral will be rebuilt, but plans for the future are uncertain. Some people believe the cathedral should be rebuilt exactly how it was before. “There are several propositions that have been made, some people want to build it exactly the same way as it was before, I don’t know if it’s technically possible,” Perrault said. “The president said that it’s going to be done before five years, I don’t think it’s possible, personally, a lot of people don’t think it’s possible because it’s such complex architecture and so much was destroyed.”
Perrault added that modernizing Notre-Dame could be a fresh start for the cathedral. “If it’s well thought, I think it could be interesting to make it more modern. It will be like a new page in history,” she said.
But talk of any change to the historical structure has been met with resistance. “I think they should keep it traditionally because that’s what makes it better, and makes it Notre-Dame, that’s what makes it what it is and I think it keeps the culture of France itself,” Dede said.
Bayar, a native of Turkey, spoke of the worldwide coverage of the fire. “I know that in Turkish newspapers it was big and covered in detail,” she said. “It was sort of talked about as a huge cultural loss to humanity at large.”
Bayar suggests that the fire at Notre-Dame may have struck a sense of instability into the world. Iconic places, like Notre-Dame, “represent stability to us, and even immortality, not at an individual level but maybe at the societal level,” she said. “When something like that disappears or is sort of completely destroyed, or something like that, we do grieve the loss and a sense of stability that perhaps is a little bit lost with it.”