Author, writer, and Newsmax contributor Paige Donner lives in a neighborhood right around the corner from the majestic Cathédrale Notre Dame de Paris. This is her eyewitness account, filed Monday evening
I live very near the Cathédrale. I was walking back in that direction from métro Cardinal Lemoine. As I approached the Pont de la Tournelle, I saw a large crowd gathered on the bridge.
A woman crossed the street in front of me just in front of La Tour d'Argent, so I stopped and asked her, Madame, what is going on?
And she responded, “Notre Dame is burning!”
At midnight, thick crowds of people were still gathered along Quai d'Orléans (on Ile Saint-Louis), Pont de la Tournelle and Quai Montebello just watching, with mouths agape and eyes wide in disbelief, as this regal and majestic 850-year-old church, the Cathédrale Notre Dame de Paris, was burning before their very eyes.
Shock. Awe, Disbelief. These were the quiet reactions of the onlookers. A few simply hurried by as if they knew that stopping to gawk at such a tragic sight would surely break their hearts.
People were almost zombie-like, mesmerized by this spectacle of a tragedy. None of the neighbors I have spoken with so far have ever been witness to something on this scale before
It looked and felt so unreal that I was sure I was watching some kind of horrible action movie.
That is what this tragic spectacle of the flames engulfing Cathedrale Notre Dame de Paris felt like this evening: Unreal.
The crowds were so thick that I couldn't really get to the other side of the church, over by St. Michel, to see from that side what was going on. But these landmarks offer the most iconic views of this grand dame of churches, the ones featured in all the wedding photos and post cards.
‘What Could Have Caused This?’
After the passerby proclaimed “Notre Dame is burning,” I suppose the reaction of horror in my eyes prompted her to continue. So she added, “There has been construction going on recently.”
This as if to answer my unasked question of, “What could have possibly caused this?”
The explanation of the construction work is a logical one. The scaffolding has been up around this grand, 850-year-old cathedral for months now.
On Thursday, I was sitting down below by the river on Quai d'Orléans, a favorite spot of my dog's because she can get her feet wet in the Seine River at the bottom of the ramp there. We watched a huge crane that afternoon lift statues off the top of the roof of the church. Ostensibly, according to the French news that night, the statues were being removed to both protect them during the renovations and also to refurbish them. They were meant to be restored and then placed back in their rightful perches at a later date.
As I crossed the street and onto the bridge that connects the Left Bank to Ile Saint-Louis, sure enough, I saw not just big chunks of thick yellow and gray billowing smoke above the church, but bright red and orange flames leaping out of its interior. One does not ever consider that a church built of thick stone could burn like that: I had never thought to see red hot orange flames leaping out of the heart of Notre Dame de Paris.
This tragedy cuts me to the core. I love the Cathedral Notre Dame de Paris. Of course, most children know the church because it is famously the home of the Hunchback of Notre Dame. But now that I reside so close to it, I have become convinced that the peacefulness that permeates this area around the church is a direct consequence of the love and prayers that have been emanating from this regal and majestic queen mother of all Catholic churches for 850 years.
I feel very closely tied to this tragedy. My father passed away on Friday morning. He was 87 years old. When he was a youth he had studied for the priesthood at a Jesuit school. It was his wish to be cremated, so we are of course respecting that. But on Sunday, I went to mass at the Cathedral Notre Dame de Paris to pay my respects to my father, in a personal and private memorial service to him.
Palm Sunday at Cathedral Notre Dame
It was Palm Sunday so the church was fairly full. But it was the early morning, the first service, so I was still able to get in without waiting in line. Coincidentally, about half way through the sermon, I looked over my shoulder to the left, and saw my friend Yin Xin's painting of the Chinese Madonna hanging in its own niche. I hadn't planned or even tried to sit near the painting, but nonetheless, that's where I found myself.
And it was comforting to feel, in such a painful personal moment of the loss of my parent, with whom I was very close, that there was an object there in my sight that I had a human connection to and with.
On Sunday, as I sat listening to the priest's Palm Sunday sermon, I noticed after group of Chinese tourists flocking around Yin Xin's Chinese Madonna painting. Even as the mass is being said, visitors can walk the interior periphery of the church to see its architecture and hear about its history.
To have a visual representation of such a powerful symbol, the Virgin Mary, depicted as a Chinese woman, hanging in the Notre Dame de Paris cathedral, must be a great source of pride to Chinese people, especially those who are Catholic. I just pray that Yin's painting, as well as the untold masterpieces and treasures of art and relics that are housed in that great structure, can be saved.
After I left the church on Sunday morning, I felt uplifted. I felt like Mother Mary, the Lord, and His Angels were telling me that my father was being whisked up to Heaven and would soon have wings of his own. I felt an all-encompassing sense that Love Is All. It was being in the church, Notre Dame Cathedral, that gave me this respite from my grief and bereavement.
Paris has withstood so much throughout the ages. The city's motto is Fluctuat Nec Mergitur. This, roughly translated, means, “Throughout it all I am still standing.”
Parisians are resilient. And even when their hearts are ripped out, such as with the Bataclan and Charlie Hebdo incidents, they still defiantly embrace life, and all that is good about it.
How Will the French Respond?
If Notre Dame de Paris proves to be gutted, this might inflict a deep wound. The cathedral is at the heart of Paris, literally and figuratively. It has symbolized Paris for 850 years. The Eiffel Tower is only 130 years old. Relatively speaking, that is a drop in the bucket of time.
So far I have not heard reports of any casualties or even injuries -- perhaps that will be the biggest difference between this devastating tragedy and those from a few years ago.
It is difficult to speculate whether the French will unite around this latest catastrophe in their beloved capital city. It is Holy Week, even non-practicing Catholics here in France still observe the holidays, religiously.
It is true that French seem to stand in solidarity with each other in the face of great tragedy. I recall just after the Bataclan terror incident, there was a huge mobilization here in Paris to get everyone out on the terraces to enjoy their cafés and lunches just as they'd always done, and not let fear dictate their behavior, their liberty of movement, or their appetite for enjoying life.
The French people are resilient. When you think of the tragic and sometimes painfully violent episodes in French history, such as the Reign of Terror following the French Revolution, you realize that they have come through a lot and have adapted and survived.
But even during the French Revolution, a period that saw the citizens of France tear apart the Bastille brick by brick with their bare hands -- not an exaggeration -- and rip their royalty from their regal carriages and Versailles Palace, even throughout all that, Notre Dame was never torched.
It has always been held sacred. It has endured unscathed, un-demolished for 850 years.
I fear that this blaze may cut to the hearts of the French people, at least those who consider themselves part of the faithful flock.
Perhaps we must console ourselves in this, that Paris and the French still stand.
Journalist, author, and Newsmax contributor Paige Donner is the founder of ParisFoodAndWine.
© 2025 Newsmax. All rights reserved.