Notre Dame: She Will Rise Again
Notre Dame in the afternoon by Henri Matisse. From Wikimedia Commons.
Notre Dame, the great church of Our Lady in the heart of Paris, at the sharp end of the Ile de la Cité, burned spectacularly last night. One of her spires pointed a flaming finger at the sky. She crackled, she roared.
But today she’s still standing.
The images were shocking, of course. Yet my take-away from this event was not doomy or gloomy, but a feeling of hope. The great cathedral, a wondrous monument to human endeavour, faith and imagination, built by teams of people over centuries, had survived a potentially devastating fire — thanks to teams of our contemporaries. A long chain of humanity stretching back hundreds of years has cherished this place.
Buildings — as any householder knows — evolve. You fix a bit here, or add a lady chapel or a new bit of stained glass there. Cathedrals need constant repair. The faithful stitch new kneelers, donate a new organ, or design a new altar cloth. The gargoyles fall and need to be replaced. Churches change all the time — and this is why the are so wonderful to visit. Within a living church, history and life as we live it now meet daily.
So I did look at the chart for the fire, but not as a disaster chart, since in fact heroism saved the day and no one died. There are no coincidences, and these great fires are full of symbolic meaning.
Exact time is from the BBC.
In fact, the Moon in this chart trined Uranus (the planet of accidents) and then made a quincunx to Vesta, the goddess of strike-a-light in fiery Aries, at the time the fire started. Vesta is also, of course, a priestess, or the goddess of the hearth, and maybe Notre Dame is the spiritual hearth of the whole city. The Sun, also in sparky Aries, was trining Jupiter in fiery Sagittarius (a sign associated with religions) on the day too. But none of this would say fire necessarily.
The chart has Libra rising, so it is ruled by Venus. Libra is, of course, a sign associated with culture and civilisation — and there’s no doubt that Notre Dame is an emblem of those ideas. There’s Cancer, the sign of the mother, on the MC, too.
Venus is making a tough angle to that fiery Jupiter — and a very nice sextile to Pluto. And here we’re coming to something special, that conjunction of Saturn-South Node-Pluto. In Capricorn, it only happens a few times in a millennium. It’s a powerful confluence of energy, and in fact, Venus (exalted in Pisces) is working with that energy. Venus is working precisely with Pluto — indeed, if you wanted to be literal, Venus in the shape of Our Lady (Notre Dame). Since she is currently in Pisces, she’s at her most ethereal, spiritual.
For more on Virgin Mary astrology, check Courtney Roberts wonderful book Visions of the Virgin Mary.
Pluto — putting aside the god we know from mythology — is a phoenix. This is what Pluto transits are about. You lose everything, and then you rise from the ashes.
There’s a message of hope for us in that fiery finger pointing at the sky. We have a scary set of transits at the moment with that Pluto-Saturn nexus down in Capricorn, the land of temporal power.
The house may be on fire, but we can save our own stained glass and gargoyles — and remake the things that are good.
Thankyou for the message of hope. As a witch I was very moved by the damage to Notre Dame as it is about more than one faith.
Yes — it’s “Our Lady”… burned but not down.
You know when I saw the news, I said to myself, Venus’s Jagermeister with Pluto was quite digestive (I was referring to my post on Facebook) and here you are touching on the same aspect.
The above chart for the outbreak of fire shows Sun at 25 Aries. 26 is the degree of Venus in the destiny tenth house and ruling the fourth house of property, art and endings of the chart I use for Christianity (i.e Pentecost AD 30). It works to this day and I’d say it works for this event. Uranus at 2 Taurus was square Pentecost’s 2 Leo rising and its 3 degree Uranus. Pluto at 23 Cap was conjunct Pentecost’s Neptune (some art and stained glass lost though not the precious rose window) and square its IC at almost 24 Libra. Asteroid PARIS in the Pentecost chart is at 24 Cap. Wounded Chiron at 3 Aries was conjunct Pentecost’s ninth house Jupiter. At the time your chart shows fire broke out, moon at 3 Virgo was square Pentecost’s 3 Gemini sun.
I think there’s a lot going on in all this with some heavy symbolism – data for Pentecost is 28th May 30 Julian, 9.15 am, Jerusalem. Overall the picture leaves me less confident of happy outcomes at this end of Piscean era, especially in view of such ghastly reports as this one which signals a major problem with now daily attacks upon churches in Europe, especially France. shorturl.at/cdex9. though the pattern is global Attacks upon churches are also now widespread in China. However as regards Europe this could imply that what has happened at Notre Dame is part of a larger pattern being ignored under indifference or PCism. Whatever, I’d say that the mentioned Pluto square is particularly relevant at this time. A lot’s going on and lot of darkness and it’s hard to get the precise facts with Pentecost’s Neptune square its MC. The first Christians suffered constant false report. Perhaps the problem now is less lies than silence about the real and emerging situation…. Wait for June when the lunation closely conjuncts Pentecost’s Saturn.
I am back, reading this on Good Friday, and thinking about how the theme of resurrection and new life is always so powerful this year. I’m so glad they are going to have a competition for designing the new spire. On top of that, think of all the interesting work for conservators, art historians and craftspeople over the next decade.