Everyone of sound mind is saddened by the destruction of Notre Dame one of the world’s great religious monuments. The cathedral was more even than that to the people of France. The centre of Paris in many ways, a vision of grace and grandeur so close to the French heart. Billionaires are queuing up to offer hundreds of millions of dollars to help with the rebuilding of this international icon. There is a coming together of secular and religious folk in a grand unity of purpose, to rebuild the wonder that is Notre Dame. That is a ray of hope about which we should rejoice.

I cannot, however, quite understand why our response to this tragedy is so immediate and generous, when other tragedies such as Yemen or Myanmar, all of immense human persecution and misery attract so little comparative reaction.

It’s as if that which is in our sight is more important than that which is not. The icons of the West are relatively more valuable than the lives of the persecuted and starved.

The billions that will be required to rebuild Notre Dame are not resented, they are wholeheartedly supported, but why? oh why? do we as human beings chose the Cathedral over the human suffering of so many.

I wish I knew.