The Cathedral at Wetzlar

Sometimes I find myself, rather by chance – if I believed in such a thing – in places whose names I am quite familiar with, because I have encountered them before in various contexts, without being able to visualise their significance. Wetzlar is such a place. Hardly would I have found it easily on the map, but I soon realised why I knew the name. After all, the town was the seat of the Imperial Chamber Court from 1689 to 1806, where Goethe, probably on the instructions of his father, was to give his legal career a decisive boost as a trainee from May to September 1772. More significant for him, however, may have been his encounter with Charlotte Buff, which, in addition to the half-hearted consideration of a suicide, also brought him ‚The Sorrows of Young Werther‘ and with it his early world fame.
Of course, the valiant people of Wetzlar do their best to cultivate Goethe’s short but intense stay, which quickly becomes apparent as one strolls through the pretty alleyways of the old town.

At some point, one’s steps are directed to the cathedral square, where a surprising sight presents itself. Wetzlar Cathedral is a sacred building unlike any other. Elements of different building phases and style periods are interlocked – not necessarily completed – which makes it look like a ruin in parts.
For over a thousand years, a church has stood on this spot, which has been rebuilt and rebuilt again and again, so that it has grown almost organically into this idiosyncratic form. You can see along its set pieces through the centuries, see Romanesque and Gothic elements, sandstone and brick and also awkwardly plastered areas that make you think of the forbidding church architecture of the present day. And indeed, the last time anything was changed here was in 1956. Also, the title cathedral is actually an imposture, albeit historically legitimised, since a bishop never resided here. Of course, the denominations squabbled over the property, which after a lengthy dispute led to it becoming a simultaneous church – it houses both the Protestant and Catholic congregations. And although Wetzlar lies on the Lahn and not on the Po, Bolshevism also finds its home under the roof of the church, just like in Guareschi’s Boscaccio. Here, however, it is amalgamated with the Catholic community in the form of a pastoral assistant whose political theology makes him flirt with totalitarian parties. Well, yes. The Wetzlar Cathedral – it seems to me – is an apt allegory of Germany in its history and present. Somehow unfinished, scarred, unable to find itself – and undermined by the spirit of the times. But if you enter it, you will find insights that cannot be well conveyed by words. Take a look for yourself.