An atheist at church

Friday the 13th, June

We went to church today. Mostly, we hoped to take shelter from the suffocating heat we suffered outside. Looking at the great beige walls towering over us, the gargoyles sucking in the sun and spitting it back out, the church of Saint-Eustache had never looked so appealing.

Before getting up and making for the entrance, we stared at the crows spread out on the sward before us. They took little jumps, their beaks pulled wide open as if held by invisible strings. Poor things, I thought, and we talked of how daft it was to feed the birds here in Paris, to stuff them like balloons and empty them of any thought other than bread bread bread. Condemned to an existence of wanting and waiting, and mindless gluttony.

Perhaps we are not so different, I thought, but I did not say.

Inside the church, the organ was playing---or being tuned, one could not exactly tell. The light spilled in soft dabs of color from the tall stained glass windows.

A sharp, long note went on for a while. Before long, it was replaced by a lower one, sudden as a gust of wind, foreboding, out of tune. A single note something like thunder, as grave as the hoary nave itself. None of the believers seemed to mind, seated uncomfortably in their wooden benches, head bowed or tilted back to the ogives, praying intently in the direction of Hell or Heaven.

I marveled at all of it. In this moment I saw that I believed in a god, and its name was Beauty. Ubiquitous, tantalizing, and terrifying.