From today's writing:
Modern Parisians walking with shoulder-shrugging indifference past Notre-Dame day after day could be an apt metaphor for the state of Christianity in a secular age. (1/6)
Modern Parisians walking with shoulder-shrugging indifference past Notre-Dame day after day could be an apt metaphor for the state of Christianity in a secular age. (1/6)
But as night fell on April 15, 2019, the people of Paris gathered in front of the still burning cathedral and held a candlelight vigil for Our Lady. There was no cheering; no one gloated; no one said, “good-riddance;” no one tweeted, “empty the pews and burn it all down.” (2/6)
Instead, television cameras showed thousands of grief-stricken faces lit by the flames, some singing hymns, others just weeping as they watched their beloved cathedral burn. I suspect many Parisians didn’t know how beloved their cathedral was until they saw it in flames. (3/6)
It would be easy to take Notre-Dame for granted, even to ignore her, and yet still assume she would always be there if you ever decided you wanted to visit her. (4/6)
Buildings burn every day, but most of them don’t cause the world to weep. A factory on fire is not the same as a cathedral on fire; Walmart in flames is not the same as Notre-Dame in flames. (5/6)
In a secular age suspicious of the sacred, we still know deep down that some things really are sacred. But sometimes we don’t know how sacred they are until they’re on fire. (6/6) 
