April  16, 2019

Anna Wood 

The Notre Dame de Paris, receiving nearly 13 million visitors a year, had a fire on the 15th. It has attracted international attention. Notre Dame de Paris was built in the 12th century as UNESCO World Heritage. It is also a famous landmark in France. The damage is not only French's loss but also a great catastrophe for human civilization.

Although the steeple and the roof of Notre Dame de Paris have collapsed, local firefighters have controlled the fire, and several groups have tried to rescue the art works stored inside the building. The total height of the Notre Dame building is more than 130 meters. It is the first all-gothic church in European history. It is of epochal significance and the most representative monument in Paris. Before the fire, the Notre Dame de Paris has been under renovation. After the fire, French President Emmanuel Macron announced that Notre-Dame will be rebuilt and started with the international fundraising activities while French billionaire Francois-Henri Pinault expressed that he would donate 100 million euros (about 3.5 billion Taiwan dollars) to help rebuild, becoming the first entrepreneur to donate a large sum.

The Vatican expressed shock and sorrow about the fire; German Chancellor Angela Merkel called Notre Dame a symbol of French and European culture; British Prime Minister Theresa May showed solicitude for French people and firefighters. US President Donald Trump said the fire was very scary. During the fire, thousands of civilians and tourists gathered near the church and expressed their shocks in different ways. Some people were in tears, and some sang paeans and prayed. Church bells in Paris rang to express condolences in a Catholic traditional way in Holy Week.

Notre-Dame de Paris is famous for Victor Hugo's literary masterpiece, The Hunchback of Notre Dame. It survived two world wars but encountered a fire in this 

turbulent era. Regardless of Christianity, Islam, Hinduism, Judaism, or atheism, people are concerned about the fire. American CNN reported that nowadays, the conflicts among politics, religion and factions are serious. The fire of French Catholic Cathedral has melted each other's hostility.   

Magnificent Notre-Dame de Paris stands on the banks of the Seine and witnesses a lot of historical events. It seems to remind people to share the world, and human history is also everyone's past. World Heritage, like a humanity concept, should be preserved and passed down from generation to generation. 

Photo:Webshot.