It is symptomatic of the importance of the position of Notre Dame in the cultural life of Paris and of France that the proposals for its redecoration after the fire that destroyed its roof have caused such an unholy row. It is not only Catholics who are agitated by what some critics have called the Disneyfication of the cathedral. The plans elicited a letter of protest from 100 academics and prominent cultural critics who declared that the renovations aimed to destroy the 19th-century reordering of the interior by Eugène Viollet-le Duc, an architect who also designed the spire; for good measure, they added that plans for video projections on the walls, ambient lighting and moveable benches were “kitsch”. 

“The Paris diocese wants to use the restoration to turn the interior of Notre Dame into a project which entirely distorts the décor and liturgical space,” they complained. “It considers that the destruction of the fire is an opportunity to transform the way the monument is understood by the visitor.” And yet the plans have been approved by the National Heritage and Architecture Commission, which had only two reservations – about the moving of the statues in the chapels that line the interior walls and the installation of high-tech pews. 

Certainly the project aims to improve the “visitor experience” for the 12 million people who come to Notre Dame each year. Part of the problem is that some experts wish to return the interior space into something like it was in the Middle Ages, when churches were ordered differently, and others wish to restore the work of Viollet-le-Duc. This is a valid area of difference. The one thing that must be kept in mind is that Notre Dame is foremost a place of worship. The centrality of its function must take precedence over the visitor experience, though there is no reason why it cannot do both well.

This article first appeared in the January 2022 issue of the Catholic Herald. Subscribe today. 

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