Thursday Doors, July 7

Since we were in the hood, as it were, strolling around my birth town last month, I just had to capture this set of doors. Sis said she couldn’t believe that I hadn’t done it yet. They are indeed a bit on a special side.

The hood is Old Ljubljana, and when we started seeing sights like the ones above, I remembered there were two doors that I’d wished to photograph for a long time.

When amore was on his first visit and we were in this same hood, he made me enter Ljubljana Cathedral for what might have been the very first time, even though I was passing it every day on my way from high school. The thing is, I didn’t even know that the rather bland looking Church of St. Nicholas was Ljubljana Cathedral. It was not like in Lucca or Orvieto or Siena where these things are clear at a glance.

(Not that I’d given it much thought. For me churches were always something perching on little hills, looking jovial but possibly scary to Turks, and that was that, until I visited France and almost lost my soles in all the churches we visited.)

But in we went, and astonished at its beauty from within I ran a quick survey and I think five Ljubljana natives gave me five different answers as to which church deserves to be called the Ljubljana Cathedral.

From that visit I don’t remember any doors. I think the one we went through might have been covered for maintenance. No matter that I wasn’t taking Thursday Doors photos yet, I’d surely remember these.

One of the bronze Ljubljana Cathedral doors.

It depicts the history of Christianity in Slovenia.

From official website, translated by me: “Beside the Ottoman plague, peasants are also troubled by the gentry and the result is a series of uprisings depicted by masses holding scythes, pitchforks and other tools.”

They “suggest you to enter through Holy Door!” Right! On my way! Having just started to read Good Omens, this seems fitting. What kind of door is this one then?

I couldn’t imagine something even holier than this.

And yet…

When you reach the Holy Door, it has lost its English.

But it speaks for itself.

I kind of guessed who the bishops were carrying, even though I had to read that there was Phoenix the Bird on the right standing on the amphora.

If somebody asked me I’d say these doors are as old as can be, even though the guy presiding in the first door looked vaguely familiar. When I checked I learnt that the “president” is indeed Pope John Paul II and that the doors were only build in 1996 for his first visit to Slovenia. The day he came over to bless them was my birthday, ahh. I turned twenty-six: much too much for high school.

Photo: a © signature mmm production

For Norm Frampton’s Thursday Doors challenge.