St. Paul's Cathedral

The first morning in St. Paul and John pointed out that we better go

see the cathedral this morning if we were going.  Oscar and I went to breakfast and it put my mind at rest a little about the big trip to Europe.  While we won’t have the same amazing amount of choices in our hotels over there that we had at our little Holiday Inn Express.  But Oscar was good about having a

 little bit of a few things to the point that I didn’t have to use a packet of food that I brought with me.   On the other hand, I realized that I’m going to need a leash in Europe because Oscar has no apparent fear of being around a crowd of people that he doesn’t know and he has learned that there are doors out 

there that when he toddles up to them, they will open automatically….and in the case of the hotel, straight onto the turnaround for cars to pull up and check in and out of the hotel.  He cannot be dissuaded from this fun new game either, so I’m going to have to tether him to me.  We headed out to the cathedral in St. Paul and it sits up on this hill and towers over the city.  It’s beautiful and majestic up there and it dominates the buildings in the town, even dwarves the capitol building.  Which is kind of how it should be when you want to name your town St. Paul…This 

  was one of two churches in America that I believe rivals cathedrals in Europe.  Whereas in Europe, you can just hit any town and find an amazing cathedral, here you have to look for the big ones that have maybe been consecrated as basilicas in the US to find something as grand.  And this 

one lives up to the place up on the hill.  It soars inside and we got to watch the practice for the Easter service, see all the greenery being brought in to pretty it up, and got to how well the acoustics echo when Oscar decided to make his hooting and screeching noises inside.  He wanted out of his stroller 

and he wanted to go anywhere that he shouldn’t.  It’s like he knew where the confessionals were, where the people were bringing in plants and anywhere that he had to be grabbed and hauled back from, which inevitably ended in a screech of protest.  So, I guess going into churches in Europe 

is out too.  The boy doesn’t seem to understand sacred spaces that are quiet.  We went outside and crawled around on the steps for a while and got a good look at the landscape.  The coolest thing about this cathedral was the copy of Michelangelo’s Pieta from St. Peters.  It was made from a 

mold of the original and then an artist polished it so that it would shine and reflect in the way that Michelangelo’s did.  What was so neat, was you could walk all the way around this one and get really close to see all the detail and the perspective tricks that he used to make it look a certain way.  For instance, Mary’s hand is significantly longer than Jesus’ foot.  When you’re up close, it looks weird, but it creates the perfect effect when you are standing away viewing it.  It was wonderful to see this work closer since it’s still behind glass in the Vatican.