Last Wednesday afternoon I witnessed, from my home balcony, a historic moment for the city: the lighting of the star and the ensemble of the Virgin Mary tower of the Sagrada Família. Perhaps I exaggerate, but I believe we would have to go back to 1992, when archer Antonio Rebollo shot the arrow that lit the Olympic cauldron in the stadium, to find such an epic moment for Barcelona. On Wednesday ---just like every time I see images of the Olympic flame being lit--- I couldn't help but get emotional and my IOB (Barcelona Pride Index) shot up to historic highs. Emotion and pride, a double feeling shared by thousands of Barcelonans and Catalans in general, judging by the messages that were being shared through social media.
TV3 also joined the party, with special programming that amplified the event ---in principle, of a religious and Barcelonan nature--- and gave it national dimension. I imagine that the most recalcitrant atheists must have been quite annoyed by a public media outlet of a non-denominational state broadcasting live the lighting of a few light bulbs of a half-finished church. In any case, after staying a good while on the balcony watching our new luminous star, in communion with dozens of neighbors from adjacent buildings whom I hadn't seen since they applauded healthcare workers, and when I could no longer feel my fingers from the cold, I went inside to continue savoring the moment through the TV. I saw Cardinal Joan Josep Omella leave the temple to greet the crowd gathered in the surroundings and I thought chapeau, gentlemen of the Sagrada Família Construction Board, you are winning by a landslide. Yes, although I can't stand football symbols and, in fact, football in general, I thought: what a great goal!
The Sagrada Família has won the match against the purist academics who consider that the temple has as much of Gaudí as top manta bags have of Gucci. Perhaps the Sagrada Família, on closer inspection, is more Faulí than Gaudí ---forgive the easy joke---, but the hundreds of thousands of visitors it receives each year absolutely don't care: for them, for practically everyone, the Sagrada Família is, indisputably, the great work of the Catalan genius.
On Wednesday ---just like every time I see the images of the lighting of the Olympic flame--- I couldn't help but get emotional and my BPI (Barcelona Pride Index) shot up to historic highs.It has also thrashed the progressives. From the ill-fated Oriol Bohigas who, as late as 2015, said that "the Sagrada Família is a global disgrace" to the Barcelona City Council's Councillor for Architecture, Daniel Mòdol, who, a year later, called it a "giant Easter cake".Without denying that the temple is a bit of a pastiche and that some decorative elements are of questionable taste ---there's some garden gnome-level sculpture---, I believe no one can seriously argue that the temple should have been left half-finished or that poor Subirachs' sculptural ensemble should be hammered down.Above all, once you enter and let yourself be amazed by that luminosity and explosion of colors from the stained glass windows. This is what happened, for example, to the architect Oscar Tusquets who, in the seventies, was one of the instigators of a manifesto against the continuation of the works of the Sagrada Família. In 2011 ---a few months after the completion of the central nave and, therefore, the Sagrada Família could be opened as a temple---, Tusquets published a full-page article inEl PaístitledHow could we have been so wrong?fruit of a recent visit to the temple that he came to consider "the best religious building of the last three centuries."
Continuing with the odious football simile, the Sagrada Família has won many more matches of great importance. It has overcome architectural challenges, bureaucratic obstacles, budgetary difficulties... However, its greatest triumph ---the goal into the top corner, I think footballers would call it---, is none of these. The Sagrada Família has managed to consolidate itself as the great icon of 21st century Barcelona and this has brutal merit. It has it because, deep down, it is somewhat anachronistic that the great symbol of today's Barcelona, so cosmopolitan, diverse and unbelieving, is a religious temple and not, for example, the superblocks. Perhaps for this reason, Mayor Ada Colau did not attend the star lighting ceremony...
"A large luminous star changes the profile of Barcelona and rises to bring light and hope," I read on the Sagrada Família website. The temple's great triumph is that a large majority of Barcelonans ---whether we pray or not and to whatever god--- feel it is ours and post photos of its star on our Instagram. Victory, by a landslide.