200 Churches in Paris and elsewhere

  198 Sofia, Bulgaria, St Alexander Nevsky cathedral Catholic churches are much easier for me than are orthodox churches. Because I know most of the stories depicted (Oh look Anne’s giving Mary another reading lesson! And look over there - isn’t Jesus nipping down to Limbo to fetch back the prophets?) Whereas I am very ignorant about orthodox stories, let alone about the specificities of the Bulgarian orthodox church as opposed to the Greek, Russian, Romanian, Serbian etc.  But on my recent trip to Bulgaria I did learn that the Bulgarian church was dominated for the longest time by the Greek church. Like you didn’t get to worship in Bulgarian, in the 18th century, you had to pray in Greek. People rarely like being made to pray in other people’s languages. The fight for an independent Bulgarian church was central to the beginnings of the struggle for liberation from the Ottoman empire. I also noticed that the baptism of Jesus is the top fave fresco in churches in Bulgaria (base...

  197 Montpellier, France, St Peter’s cathedral Of all the cathedrals I have ever visited, which is quite a number, this one has my favourite entrance, with fabulous intimidating pointy pillars. It is Gothic in style and was built in the 14th century, but had to wait a couple of hundred years to become a cathedral. It got damaged when Catholics were fighting Protestants round here in the 16th century. Dozens were killed in the cathedral and the Protestants demolished one of its four towers. There was major rebuilding in parts of the cathedral in the 19th century. It is still a very active parish, and you can, for example, on “Theology Mondays” go and discuss about how to be in the world without being of the world. Always a handy skill to add to your CV. There are some very fine paintings, and a monumental bishop’s chair. A plaque tells us that the Brotherhood of the Holy True Cross was based in this church after 1672 and refounded here after the French Revolution.