Despite the confinement, the Church is organizing to be able to celebrate Easter Week. This Good Friday, it is in the heart of Notre-Dame that a ceremony will take place in very small groups, exceptionally and on the initiative of the diocese of Paris.
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Seven people will be present. Four clerics: Mgr Michel Aupetit, Mgr Patrick Chauvet, rector of Notre-Dame, Mgr Denis Jachiet, auxiliary bishop, Father Luc de Bellescize, private secretary of Mgr Michel Aupetit and three artists: the actors Philippe Torreton and Judith Chemla who will read texts and the violinist Renaud Capuçon, who will accompany this time of meditation and prayer around the crown of thorns, saved during the fire last April. Added to this are technicians from the BFMTV channel in order to broadcast the event live as well as a photographer.
"A very strict protocol"
This ceremony is all the more unusual since it takes place while France is plunged into a health crisis, but also because the construction site of consolidation of the cathedral is stopped. It will be held in the apse behind the heart of Notre-Dame, one of the rare spaces spared by flames and falling rubble, now secure.
But the lead decontamination site is far from complete. Each person on the small committee must therefore follow a very strict protocol: compulsory wearing of coveralls, gloves, masks or safety shoes. There will be no exception, specifies the actor Philippe Torreton who recounts, amused: "It is the first time that I am going to read a text with a construction helmet on the head and these combinations of cosmonaut. I think that visually it's going to be strange. These are the security conditions and I think they obviously have to be respected. "
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The clerics, meanwhile, will also be gloved and masked, but they will keep their liturgical garments. At the exit, they will have to change. The clothes will be immediately cleaned up by a specialized laundry. All participants also agree to follow a covid-19 protocol: respect barrier gestures and stand more than a meter apart from each other around the crown of thorns. The ceremony will be broadcast live from 11:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. on BFM TV and KTO.