We went to four churches in Paris.
Notre Dame: I had been to before, my memory of it was very romantic, cavernous, dark, crowded with visitors, lit only by candlelight, and I lit a candle there too, for for my grandmother, this was right after she died. This time my experience was more pedestrian. I still loved it, the iconic shape, the famous stained glass, the dozen art alcoves, but there was not that additional personal inclusion. It's still deservedly a central sight of Paris, and it was lovely to see the spires of Notre Dame from all sorts of different angles, you hit the Seine from our apartment and could see them in the distance.
Picpus Cemetery and church: Harmony wanted to go here for Lafayette's grave, and it's a very small and unknown little church buried in the 11th arrondissement. It is also however, the location of the mass graves for the victims of the French terror. It was the most spiritual church we've been to for me. We arrived on Harmony's first night, with a burgeoning thunderstorm. There was a sweet scented rose garden outside. You squeezed through a heavy blue door into one of those grey stone churches that look like concrete but aren't. We were literally the only people inside, and it was that late afternoon, starting to cool into evening. The distant boom of thunder seemed to shake the roof of the church and increased the hush inside. The names of all the terror victims were carved in marble on the wall, and there were fresh flowers inside the church. It felt like a prayer. Outside was the graveyard with Lafayette. Harmony brought a rock from Mt Vernon to leave there as an offering, and she wasn't the only one, there was heaps of US dollars and bits of US battlefields there. Behind the graveyard were the two mass graves and the last empty ones. Banks of roses and mock orange grew along the pathways, all of them perfumed. Tall oakish trees lined the other side. There were chickens who wandered through the yard and a small bee hutch. The gates where the bodies were brought in were still there.
Saint Sulpice: The Delacroix museum's special exhibit was all about Delacroix's influences and artistic process when making this major mural. The exhibit was interesting, but possessed a lack of major finished Delacroix works. Kind of buried in all the description about this mural though, was an interesting tidbit that Delacroix took these apartments for their proximity to the church and that you could retrace his footsteps. Intrigued, but doubting it could be real, we did that thing. There around a nondescript corner was a fantastic gothic church with this major trio of Delacroix murals one on each side panel and the ceiling, plus we'd just finished learning all about how his Jacob wrestling the angel showed them as two equals, man wrestling his destiny, etc. In the same church was also a little modern art exhibit of crumpled white cloth pictures and incense, very atmospheric, and outside there was a nice public fountain and some soccer playing boys.
Saint Chappelle
This church was a real highlight of the whole trip. Harmony had read somewhere that it was one of the best examples of stained glass in Europe and it was an example of guide books not overstating the matter. Pro tip about Paris, this church is about two blocks from Notre Dame, just as good, much less visited, and very different in type, def put it on that day of Paris wandering wherein you go see Notre Dame. It does cost a mint to get in, ten or 15 euros but it's worth it. You go up a narrow stairwell into this cavernous space every inch of which is done up in stained glass. It has an incredible Rosa, and then it's got these very high Gothic points and the tops of them tell say the Bible story and then there's the middle with all these saints and etc, like you could look into each panel for sometime and there are like 15 panels that go around. Not windows in the way you think of churches, but these are like the walls. They have leaned into a lot of colour, so each panel is a rich rainbow. All of the woodwork around the windows has been richly painted, which apparently used to be common, but it's mostly worn off places and they've mostly left it worn off bc they don't want to paint over the church. Here the paint is in full effect, either that well preserved or they decided to restore it so of course the gilding and rich rainbow suffuses every square inch of wall. It was pretty incredible. On the top five most lovely churches I've ever seen.
Which would be what btw?
Basilica de San Petro (Rome) I mean c'mon it's got Michaelangelo's pieta in it, plus is maybe the best of the white marble dome variety of churches
Sagrada Familia gotta give a shout out to the only truly great church of the modern age and the light, pretty incredible
Surely a Russian one, maybe St Isaac's? What was the one that was across the street from us the first time we went, that's the strongest feels, or church of the spilled blood with the glittering mosaics, but I didn't feel as much, or the white one where pussy riot performed, or the onion dome one, best outside but that one doesn't have the best inside
The half bombed church in Berlin I don't know if would make the final cut but is definitely one of my favorite ever and fusion of traditional and modern so effective.
Saint Chappelle best stained glass. Nuff said.
Well that's five but I could I get into to top ten territory here pretty easy.
Notre Dame would be somewhere on the top ten list as well, but I don't know where it ranks vs the Russians What am I forgetting travel partners? Any votes?
