Catholic church's proposed redesign of Notre Dame interior provokes outrage | Hacker News Reader

Catholic church's proposed redesign of Notre Dame interior provokes outrage

theartnewspaper.com

22 pointsrmason65 comments

> Last Friday, the British conservative newspaper The Telegraph denounced the reimagined Notre Dame as a “politically correct Disneyland” and an “experimental showroom”.

Some sort of reverse psychology plot to get the French to go ahead with the plans I presume?

> “It’s Notre Dame de Paris turned into Disneyland,” claims the Paris-based architect Maurice Culot, the author of several books on religious architecture in the 19th century. “It does not make any sense”

Cathedrals were the theme parks of their era, expensive buildings dedicated to work as an economic focal point and gather visitors from far away, to expose them to a narrative journey on a single theme.

So it only makes sense that they rebuilt it for the same *purpose*, adapted to today's conditions. People complain about not rebuilding it in the same *style* as in the twelfth century, but we are not in the same society so the narratives from that time would not work the same way.

That's like saying every historical monument or building should be redesigned in a modern context. No thanks.

What's so bad about fire safety?

Obviously the controversy is not regarding any sort of changes made to improve fire safety.

They've been doing that to cathedrals for 𝚝̶𝚠̶𝚎̶𝚕̶𝚟̶𝚎̶ seventeen centuries, why would they stop doing it now?

For reasons of expense (and some others) its usually pretty gradual with cathedrals, plus, most active cathedrals — those that are still operating as episcopal seats — are not owned by a State that wavers between indifferent and actively hostile to the Church.

And even modest remodels of cathedrals (or even parish churches, or auxiliary buildings like parish halls) tend to be controversial, without Church-State tension, or larger scale remodeling of the type at issue here.

It was not gradual when the cathedral suffered a fire or a collapse. They would rebuild a traditional romanesque basilica in a gothic fantasy of endless towers seeking the sky; or they would install a baroque dome and façade, completely modernising the appearance of the building.

> It was not gradual when the cathedral suffered a fire or a collapse.

Yeah, my point is that those are unusual events, resulting in bigger remodels and associated larger controversies, while even the more routine remodels tend to be controversial.

That is, while the event precipitating it may be somewhat unusual, the situation resulting from the precipitating event, including the large proposed modernizing remodel and the controversy over it, is not at all an abnormal result of such an event.

> They've been doing that to cathedrals for 𝚝̶𝚠̶𝚎̶𝚕̶𝚟̶𝚎̶ seventeen centuries, why would they stop doing it now?

Because not all "modern contexts" are equivalent. We're at a point now where the "modern context" is so cheap it's become boring and mundane.

If the building hadn't been redesigned in a modern context several times throughout its life, it would have been an old dilapidated stone church and not the icon it is today. The reason people care about this church and that it resonated with people throughout history is that it has continuously been redesigned and renovated in a modern context.

Yes, but usually that's done with respect for what's already there, not "hey we have millions of donations, let's throw all this old junk away and install a multimedia show for tourists instead".

Quotes to support my statement:

> Altars in the chapels would also be displaced and only four confessionals maintained on the ground floor.

> So the chapels, some of which could be renamed after Asia, Africa and other themes, should display “multiple offerings” such as light projections of Bible quotes in foreign languages including Chinese.

That's a very modern mindset, dating to the second half of the XXth century.

Before that, the mindset for reconstructing historic places was pretty much "hey we have millions of donations, let's throw all this old junk away and install a multimedia show for tourists".

One might say that any old historic building that is not in ruins has already underwent at least one of reform in that style.

> Yes, but usually that’s done with respect for what’s already there, not “hey we have millions of donations, let’s throw all this old junk away and install a multimedia show for tourists instead”.

There’s always a complex dialogue between maintaining what exists, cost, and adapting to new practices and ideals. Where there is massive destruction, though, that usually shifts the balance far in the direction of new designs, because cost no longer heavily favors the status quo.

Speculating wildly, I'm wondering if part of it is a fundamental conflict in what the church is for. Is it a museum (what the State wants) or an "indoctrination center" (what the Church wants).

From the Churches point of view, if no one leaves thinking "maybe Catholicism is for me after all" then on some level they're not doing their job right. I guess that explains the focus on Chinese tourists since that is a huge untapped 'market' I'm sure they would love to break into. Having "multiple offerings" makes it easier to A/B tests different types of marketing and tailor the sales pitch to the audience. At the end of the day the Catholic church has always been business and their primary goal is to convert as many 'customers' as possible, and church architecture as always been a reflection of that mission.

They want to move the other confessionals to the 1st floor. The chapels were near derelict before the fire apparently.[1] Renaming chapels and projecting lights doesn't have to mean throwing away things anyway.

[1] https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/dc03e1b8-512d-11ec-8d72-b...

> If the building hadn't been redesigned in a modern context several times throughout its life, it would have been an old dilapidated stone church and not the icon it is today. The reason people care about this church and that it resonated with people throughout history is that it has continuously been redesigned and renovated in a modern context.

The old Church did resonate with me (though the Sagrada Familia definitely resonated more), but a modern light-show definitely wouldn't resonate at all.

I think think part of the point of cathedrals is to be a little otherworldly, and chasing the "modern context" subverts that. That may not have been true in the past (stained glass is insanely expensive and you definitely wouldn't have seen it everywhere hundreds of years ago, even if it was state-of-the-art), but it's definitely true now.

> Cathedrals were the theme parks of their era

More like public capital buildings, but those themselves have a cultural function with regard to the sponsoring entity that results in them being something like theme parks, so the analogy isn’t completely inapplicable.

And “are”, not “were”. Cathedrals are still a thing, of course, and are still built, and the interiors reconfigured, in accordance with the changing views of the local and universal Church as to liturgical practices and pastoral needs.

by the same thought pattern, we should rebuild colosseum into a mega mall, right?

Whatever was the purpose of given historical monument the key word is WAS. We are not living in those times and its a place that ties us to our past, historical portal. That's its function now.

Or brexiteers making a storm in a glass of water in order to justify the actual fights over the Channel fishing/migration/whatnot.

I'm not a Catholic, but I am religious. First visited the Notre Dame Cathedral in 1975. Kind of hard to put it in words but it was a place of great beauty and at the same time I felt a deep sense of spirituality.

The feeling of spirituality was present the entire time that I was in the building. The last thing I'd want this old church to become is the latest Disneyesque attraction. Old school cool is still the preferred way to go.

I am by no means religious, and yet there are certain places that just feel special. Old churches and monasteries for example, regardless of where they are in the world. I've never been to Notre Dame, but Mt. St. Michel has that feeling. As do medieval churches and cathedrals in general. Or monasteries in the Himalaya. Or Petra. No modern day church comes close to that, and even medieval churches that were modernized, Barock or later, loose a lot of that feeling.

I feel the same way, I'm not religious too and still feel that those places are very special. I think it helps me empathise with religious people. When I'm in a church, I can understand a little bit better what people mean when they say they are religious, have faith, believe in God.

No modern day church comes close to that

That is just not true. There are plenty of great modern day churches if you go looking for them, they're just not tourist attractions.

How much of that je ne sais quois can be attributed to the age of the building, the scale and the handcrafted nature? Will that feeling be lost if a 1:1 replica is created?

I wonder what the original designers and craftspeople would have thought? If they would be in favour of a facsimile or an entirely new reinvention using contemporary architectural ideas

Whenever a cathedral suffered fires or collapses, or simply when a section went out of fashion and they had plenty of spare money from trade, they would indeed rebuild entire sections in a contemporary updated style; so I think that answers your question.

Most of the effect must surely be attributed to the conscious choices explicitly designed to make you feel small and pious, right? Though I think for some people a fair bit of the experience comes from thinking it is very old and holy, so if you tell them it's a 1:1 replica they'd be disappointed.

Probably the original craftspeople would be hella jealous about reinforce concrete and insist on building some big towering monstrosity that doesn't respect the architecture around it. That was after all what they set out to build, a big hopping temple to god that puts everything around it to shame: give those guys a big budget and reinforced concrete and you have a new flight hazard in the middle of Paris.

I wasn't religious the first time I visited the Temple Mount in Jerusalem. But some places seem to have a certain air about them that really inspires introspection and wonder.

I'm not going to conclude that these places bring one closer to a deity, but they most certainly do stimulate the senses in a fashion that is both unusual and comforting. Yet no single sense - not sight nor smell nor hearing I think - really register anything unusual. And the experience is most certainly not personal, rather many people report similar feelings in such places. Though I won't rule out placebo effect because they've been told the place is "holy".

This place is not just a museum. It is also a place of worship.

As long as nothing of historical value is damaged any further than the devastating fire has already managed to damage, it stands to reason for the catholic church to have a large input in the design.

The catholic cleric responsible mentions this building with its 800 years of history has always been a living building. I find his argument to make a lot of sense.

This also holds from a legal perspective. The building might be owned by the state. That does not mean the state gets to decide all of the restauration. There's a fascinating piece of history to read up on, including the concordat between the catholic church of France and Napoleon [0], and the 1905 law on separation of church and state [1].

Another way to rebuild could be to do what sometimes happens to historical organ rebuilds. Building back to the historical state at a specific point in time could be a very interesting, albeit expensive option. I would very much be interested in seeing Notre Dame's inside painted in very vivid colors like research suggests it might have been during the gothic era.

And since everyone and their cat seems to be mentioning their religious affiliation or lack thereof... I say this as a pastafarian.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Concordat_of_1801 [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1905_French_law_on_the_Separat...

> “Chinese visitors may not necessarily understand the Nativity,” said the priest.

How about building two large parking lots on the Notre Dame square then for Chinese tourist buses to drive directly up to the building. And offer selfie sticks next to the altar. Seriously, what kind of insane logic is this... The church is not a tourism bureau

> The church is not a tourism bureau

Yeah, it is.

Or, rather, it is, as a central function a propaganda [0] bureau, and leveraging tourism has proven to be a useful and important component of that in the modern world.

[0] the modern use of the term, after all, derives ultimately from the former name of the Church body currently known in English as the Congregation for the Evangelization of Peoples, which used to be the Sacred Congregation for the Propagation of the Faith, or in its Latin short form, Propaganda fide.

> what kind of insane logic is this

What's the problem with explaining Christian concepts in a Christian building that is visited by many non-Christian visitors?

I thought proselytism was a large point of these religions, so it only seems logical to take advantage of this opportunity for explaining their faith to potential new clients.

The church is not a tourism bureau

Depends on who you talk to. If you ask the people that own the church building (the French State) then yes, it's all about tourism. If you talk to the capital C Church then it is probably primarily about propaganda (although they probably wouldn't call it that). They don't want Chinese tourists to walk around and come away thinking "wow that was a neat old building" they want the Chinese tourists to come away with a appreciation and interest in Catholicisms that can be a wedge towards conversion. Showing them some relics of western "mysticism" they do not understand is not conducive to that goal.

The people who care about if it's a nice space for Sunday Mass are by all accounts the least important people in this equation.

To clear some confusion : the French state owns the building and the Church is given use of it for cultural, historical and patrimonial considerations (it's just better for a building to keep its original use on-going if you want it to survive as best as possible). In that framework, it's normal for the religious authorities to decide of the interior decoration to the extent it's impermanent.

The article makes it sound much worse than it is. The truth is the Church makes stylistic choices that some people (including myself) don't like and they end up making a fuss about it.

Anybody got a better link of what it will look like? The article has only one tiny image and links to a recording of a 30-minute Zoom call: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uB_Dm9pN4FQ

> Father Drouin’s proposed interior redesign of Notre Dame will be submitted to France’s national cultural heritage commission on 9 December

As is frustratingly common, the media is stirring up opinion based on vague details and assumptions from a 30 minute video call in May. If there was more detail available it would be more difficult to tell people what to think.

They start showing images around minute 18:

https://youtu.be/uB_Dm9pN4FQ?t=1076

I am watching the presentation in French... is the "The Telegraph" on drugs? The guy is literally re-organizing the space using theological reasons first and foremost - not touristic considerations.

Literally, he is thinking how people can understand catholic faith better by organizing the cathedral spaces in a way that is spiritually more meaningful.

Once again: don't trust the media.

> is the "The Telegraph" on drugs?

It's the Telegraph talking about France.

> don't trust the media I am not a billionaire with my own secret service. I need to trust dinner general media. And I trust a lot of the media, but not everyone, and some more in some topics than others.

How do you choose who to trust?

The Telegraph is mainlining drugs which have side effect of thinking that everything was better in the old days and nothing should ever change as change scares the old people.

It is a posh, old school conservative tabloid and very flexible on what it considers to be the truth.

There is a possibility that we will see a reversion of mass tourism that clogged big cities and monuments in the decades coming. This move looks like trying to fight the previous war.

Anyway, as the article states, the catholic church does not own Notre-Dame. Since the revolution, it belongs to the french state so this debate is probably a storm in a teapot.

> This move looks like trying to fight the previous war.

With 12 millions visitors per year (pre fire/covid), they are probably willing to take that risk.

> But Culot argues that the government “has already approved a compromise by leaving the Church the initiative for the interior of the cathedral”

Two lines above:

> Father Drouin’s proposed interior redesign of Notre Dame will be submitted to France’s national cultural heritage commission on 9 December and the culture minister, Roselyne Bachelot, may have the final say on matters [...]

As I said: teapot.

"How many divisions does the Pope have in the field?" They have no means to force a design on the cathedral that the French public dislikes.

  > They have no means to force a design on the cathedral that the French public dislikes.

Historically, almost every time this has been true from a legal perspective yet challenged by the papacy, the papacy has won. I'm not saying that they will challenge it this time, but the papacy looks towards the next millennium, not the next decade or quarter as do most public institutions.

For what it's worth, I'm neither Catholic nor Christian.

That's not actually true from a legal perspective anyway. The church is in charge of maintaining furniture even in the buildings that are owned by the state.

It's also not true that the papacy has always won when they challenged law, as it did initially challenge the law of 1905 by refusing to create a legal entity registered in France at the time, refusing to declare masses (as public reunions). In exchange, the state kept property of all furniture and non-cultual church property (presbyteries, seminaries, etc) without any clause for use by the Church. Many have been sold since then, or used for various purposes. The Church eventually caved in in 1924 but that was too late to regain use of these buildings.

For the particular topic of the redesign of this cathedral though, I don't see the general public really caring about it, I don't see the church pushing for this design in particular either (this is just one proposition by one team, among many others) and I don't see the state caring much either beyond general considerations to choose between the various design proposals.

  > That's not actually true from a legal perspective anyway. The church is in charge of maintaining furniture even in the buildings that are owned by the state.

Terrific point, thank you. I'm not aware of the specifics of the institutions in France.

  > It's also not true that the papacy has always won when they challenged law, [...]

Yes, there have been exceptions. I added the word "almost" to my original comment. Thank you.

It's easier to get your will if your opposition legitimates their rule by "god wills that I am the king" and you are the final authority on what god wills. I think that situation has changed a bit since the last time the papacy has won a conflict.

Interesting choice of words - and I agree with it.

But I would add that the theological aspect has usually been accompanied by the will of a large mass of people willing to disrupt order on behalf of the papacy. I believe that aspect still exists, even in secular France today, though to what degree I'm not sure. Likely, the secular French of today are as willing to fight unrest as those dedicated to the church are willing to fight for it.

Holy wars are horrible. Best avoided, and both sides know that.

I would be automatically on board on a plan that restore it to its original form. That's what's called "repair the old to be like old" (修旧如旧 in Chinese), one core principle of most antique repair/maintenance projects.

How far back is the "original"? Is it to the state before the 1840's restoration?

Considering how utterly dreadful « restoration » is in mainland China, I'd rather stick to our procedures.

I wonder what's your evidence of implying China's restoration is poor or bad.

Restoration in the forbidden City has been remarkable. https://youtu.be/avrRiNUmOlY it clearly has kept its original style and sentiment.

plan that restore it to its original form

Which "original form". The 12th Century form? 13th Century? 15th? 19th? The way it looked a week before the fire?

I can assure you that if they restored to its true original form people would be far more pissed about that than any possible "modern" design.

From the perspective of the Church, maximizing the opportunity for updating spaces based on the current models of liturgical practice and pastoral (including evangelization) needs is rather more the default than “repair the old to be like the old”.

This makes me think of my visit to castles in Japan. Most of them were destroyed by natural disasters or fire at some point and had to be rebuilt. Some castles were rebuilt in their original style while some were modernized.

When I visited the ones rebuilt in the original style I felt like I entered a time machine and the history and culture I had learned about felt very real and near, and I felt motivated to learn more.

You look at Osaka castle from the outside and it’s majestic. But once you enter it’s just a f*king museum. You completely forget you’re in a castle. It still pisses me off how one can not only neglect but destroy their heritage like that.

I mean it's a fairly simple question right?

It's either property of the Catholic Church, and so it's their choice what to do with it, after all it is their money, and they don't receive any financial support or tax breaks from the government.

Or it's public property, in which case it's the choice of the public and the Catholic Church has no input.

I mean, even if it wasn't property of the church it wouldn't be as simple as that. You could ask this question about everything - if a museum receives substantial grants to operate, is it still within the decision of its owner to do with it as they please, or not? If the money was given without any specific restrictions then I'd say yes, it is entirely within their view.

Certainly in the Anglican church if you give a thing (rather than money) it becomes a persistent issue since disposing of it in any way is really difficult. It is not simple ownership as you or I might understand.

It's trickier than you think from a legal perspective because of the peculiarities of French history.

It's property of the state, and the church doesn't receive financial support or tax breaks, but it's still in charge of maintaining the interior and furniture of the buildings they use. Some of the furniture is property of the state (what dates from before 1905, but now always everything) and some is property of the church.

However, this is also a historical monument and the state has to ensure that they are well-maintained (including parts that are privately owned) and not disfigured, and can grant financial support for restorations when needed.

Well, most people have massive change aversion. So, it may well be that this redesign is rubbish. Or that it is great.

The thing is that irrespective of its quality, any redesign would provoke outrage. Which makes the outrage kind of pointless as a measure of quality. M

Well, in this case there's a question as to whether a redesign is necessary at all, vs recreating what was there before the fire, so objecting to it without seeing details of the design (however great they might turn out to be) isn't necessarily irrational. Also there are some details given in the article: contemporary art, luminous benches, etc.

Also, objection isn't necessarily outrage. I'm pretty skeptical of the proposal as described, but I'm not going to Paris with a pitchfork. Do our reactions to everything have to be interpreted in the most extreme, binary way possible?

An analogy with the hermeneutic of continuity is appropriate. Breaking with Tradition (typically accomplished by preserving original texts, but attaching completely new meanings to the words) wrecks that continuity and cuts people off from the lifeblood of the Faith. Architecture reflects the liturgy, and, as we say, lex orandi, lex credendi, lex vivendi, it is to be fully expected that this modernist rupture would produce silly architecture and appeals to changing architectural styles in the past fall flat when we begin to understand this point.

While Vatian II was a licit council, the aftermath of confusion produced a playground for modernist opportunists who ravaged the Church with the most preposterous attempts to remake the Church in the image of the World instead of the other way around. Watch out for phrases like "making the faith more relevant". The more "relevant" the Church has become, the more it resembled the World, the more apostasy it witnessed: if mass is no longer the unbloody sacrifice, but a mediocre rock concert full of sappy music, then what's the point? So I don't really buy any of these stale boomer arguments about needing to "adapt to the times". Certainly, one may respond to the times, but when the word "adapt" is used, this is just a euphemism for remodeling, usually in an underhanded way.

In any case, France, the eldest daughter of the Church, is a post-Catholic country. Notre Dame, for most French, has already been a museum. All this does is formalize the transition.

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