Rebirth rising from a rain of fire

ONCE YOU’VE SEEN its curlicued, domed outline and experienced its uplifting, bright, pastel interior, it’s hard to understand why some Dresdeners were opposed to the reconstruction of the Frauenkirche, the 18th century Protestant cathedral that was destroyed by the infamous Allied firebombing that devastated this city in February 1945.

But then again, the politics of remembrance are a complicated business in Germany. For nearly 60 years, the Frauenkirche, the Church of Our Lady, was to Dresden what Dresden was to the world -- a powerful symbol of the horrors of war, second only to Hiroshima. Until the fall of the Berlin Wall, long after Dresden had been rebuilt, the church’s rubble -- ruined walls and a pile of blackened stones -- remained untouched, a grim memorial in the center of town.

But shortly after the collapse of East Germany, a group of concerned locals issued “A Call from Dresden.” Recognizing that neither the government nor the church had the money to restore the structure, the group made an appeal to the world for help in rebuilding what they hoped would become a “Christian center for world peace.” The response was remarkable; the plea brought in 100 million euros, from within Germany and beyond.

The painstaking reconstruction of the Baroque gem, which looks something like a 314-foot-high ornate teapot, was funded largely through private donations. The money helped pay for sophisticated computer modeling that enabled 21st century stonemasons to put many of the church’s 18th century stones back in the very place where they had been before the building fell. The specks of black stone give the otherwise smooth golden sandstone exterior a mottled look, with the old jumbled in with the new.

Some Dresdeners still express mixed feelings about the redo. “I think the church should have been left in a heap of rubble as a monument to the past,” one survivor of the bombing told a BBC reporter at the reconsecration in October. But when most Dresdeners speak of the church now, they use the language of nostalgia and hope. Before the Frauenkirche was rebuilt, there was something missing, they say, not only from Dresden’s skyline but from the city’s soul. This feeling is particularly strong among the elderly, some of whom remember thinking, as children, that hearing the choir sing from the rim of the cupola in the sanctuary sounded like voices from heaven.

Since the Frauenkirche was reconsecrated, a quarter of a million tourists have passed through its doors, many of them from western Germany. Even before the “Call from Dresden,” the church served as a symbol of national reunification. In December 1989, one month after the Berlin Wall fell, then-Chancellor Helmut Kohl chose the site for his first visit to East Germany and addressed the audience from a makeshift platform in front of the rubble.

But rebuilding the Frauenkirche only deepened its appeal to the national psyche. Because it was accomplished not by the state but through a rare American-style effort of private individuals and corporations, many Germans feel a powerful connection to the rebuilt church. More than a few of them see this as an unprecedented showing of self-driven civic engagement that could signal a stronger, more unified civil society. In a country that has recently been mired in a deep malaise, the church inspires hope.

Of course, dozens of other German cities suffered devastation during World War II. Dresden’s national appeal stems in large part from its heritage as a cultural capital. Long before the war, it was known as the most beautiful of German cities, called by some Florence on the Elbe. Canaletto, court painter to a Saxon king, painted its skyline. Mahler and Wagner premiered choral and symphonic works here. Bach, from nearby Leipzig, tested the organ in the Frauenkirche when it was first built. In 1768, the great German poet Goethe famously wrote that “Dresden is a magnificent place, and if a small stipend were made available to me here, I would never wish to leave.”

Contemporary Germans often see Dresden -- and it’s iconic Frauenkirche -- standing for the nation at its best. Because of Nazism, Germany is often scared of allowing itself feelings of national pride; the reconstruction of the Frauenkirche is an unabashedly proud symbol of Germany’s slow, painful reconciliation with itself.

But even in its reconstructed glory, it doesn’t deny the rain of fire that British and American warplanes loosed on the city. That still-controversial act of war, with its massive collateral damage, is one of a very few that Germans can use to acknowledge their own suffering during World War II. For many of them, the fact that the British made significant contributions to the Frauenkirche’s restoration is a historic balm. The monumental gilded cross atop the church was donated by the Dresden Trust in Britain, which was established to raise money for the Frauenkirche, and one of the silversmiths was the son of a pilot who participated in the Dresden bombing.

Today, only a tiny minority of Dresdeners are regular churchgoers (the communist era wasn’t kind to religious belief), but as I write this, the church is planning for six standing-room-only Christmas services at the Frauenkirche. The lines are expected to snake across the plaza. In all of Germany, this may be the last, best place for that very old message: Peace on Earth, goodwill to men.