The fire on April 15th, 2019, knocked out much of the Notre Dame Cathedral and devastated the people of France and across the world of the Catholic faith. The fire lasted several hours damaging much of the building, including the historic spires. Luckily most of the interior and the structure remain undamaged.

The government of France is asking for any donations towards slowly over time rebuilding the Notre Dame Cathedral. Estimations say the repairs needed to rehabilitate the 800-year-old Cathedral, will take an extensive 40 years.

Jarod Henderson, a senior student attending Prior Lake High School, said, “My family has donated to the cause to rebuild the Notre Dame Cathedral. My church has donation boxes available, and my family wanted to be apart of rebuilding the Notre Dame Cathedral because we thought it was a good way to tithe and participate in Catholic Charity.” Jarod stressed that he and his older sister had been wanting to travel to France.

Notre Dame Cathedral has received over 1 Billion dollars in donations since the incident of the fire. In fact, it received several million in the first hour. French officials stress that the billions the cathedral has received may not be enough to fix all of the repairs however, causing millions of people to donate even more.

Hunter Kerkow, a sophomore at Prior Lake High school, said, “I donated to rebuilding the Notre Dame Cathedral because I felt that if I helped out as much as I could, that it would inspire others to do so too.” Hunter is very proud of his country and history, and he feels that the cathedral is important.

Tyler Hastings, a senior at Prior Lake High school, said, “My family is super religious, especially my grandma, so we felt as if we should donate to the Notre Dame Cathedral to help the rebuilding process.”

Blake Redetzke, a senior at Prior Lake High school, said, “My family is not donating to the fund for repairs but we will be sending our prayers”  Blake was not too concerned with the Cathedral fire as he is Jewish.

Redetzke also said, “The Notre Dame fire didn’t affect me much personally, my grandmother was rather upset, however”. His grandmother sent a sum of 2000 dollars.

Henderson said, “It was on our bucket list, but now we are going to have to wait till it is repaired. It’s a bummer, but it will still be worth it when we do finally get there and be able to say we helped build it.”

Kerkow was starting to get very prideful, he said, “It’s super important because of the reasoning the pilgrims came to America.” His facts might not exactly be accurate, but he still has pride and has still donated all he could.

Hastings said, “I think the Cathedral needs our help to be rebuilt, because I take pride in helping others, especially when it comes to religious things like the Notre Dame Cathedral.”