美国国家公共电台 NPR Colombia's Salt Cathedral Is A Marvel Of Architecture And A Popular House Of Worship

 

SCOTT SIMON, HOST:

Christians¹ around the world will attend church tomorrow on Easter Sunday. In Colombia, some will gather 600 feet underground in a former salt mine. Colombia's Salt Cathedral is both an architectural wonder and a popular house of worship. Here's reporter John Otis.

JOHN OTIS, BYLINE²: To enter the Salt Cathedral, we walk through a tunnel once used by hundreds of miners. Dank and spooky, it seems to be taking us into the bowels³ of the earth. But soon, Roman Catholic icons⁴ come into view.

ANDRES ORTIZ: OK, visitors, welcome to the salt mine. Welcome to the Salt Cathedral.

OTIS: Tour guide Andres Ortiz leads us past sculptures of angels and the Stations of the Cross that are carved into the rock salt walls.

ORTIZ: This is all carved by hand - take five years to build all the Stations of the Cross.

UNIDENTIFIED CROWD: (Singing in Spanish).

OTIS: Deeper down, the temple opens up to reveal three naves⁵, a basilica dome⁶ and a floor-to-ceiling cross illuminated⁷ with purple lights. There are also rows of pews that are now filling up for mass.

UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #1: (Singing in Spanish).

OTIS: For all of its splendor⁸, the Salt Cathedral had modest beginnings. It's located in Zipaquira, an Andean mining town near the capital city of Bogota. Before their shifts, workers would visit a small chapel⁹ built inside the salt mine to pray for protection from accidents. After removing tons of salt, they left behind a network of tunnels and caverns¹⁰.

JORGE CASTELBLANCO: (Speaking Spanish).

OTIS: Mining engineer Jorge Castelblanco says most exhausted¹¹ mines are simply abandoned and sealed up. But in this case, miners and Roman Catholic Church officials persuaded the Colombian government to convert all that empty space into a church in 1953. Structural¹² problems forced its closure in 1990. That's when Castelblanco, 127 miners, plus a handful of sculptors¹³ were brought in to build the current version of the cathedral. It's now located 200 feet below the original. Castelblanco said one of the biggest challenges was transferring the massive altar carved from rock salt from the old site to the new.

CASTELBLANCO: (Speaking Spanish).

OTIS: "It weighed 16 tons," Castelblanco says. "To move it, we had to divide it into three pieces." The effort appears to have paid off.

UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #2: (Speaking Spanish).

OTIS: Many visitors, like Reagan Jeffries, a Dallas-area schoolteacher, are amazed by what they see.

REAGAN JEFFRIES: Just as far as the structure, I was just - how do you even make this? How do you bring the equipment down and - I mean, he said there were only less than 150 miners involved. That's insane to me. I just found it to be incredibly impressive.

UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #3: (Singing in Spanish).

OTIS: It's also breathed new life into the local economy. Salt mining here has dwindled¹⁴, but now, thousands of tourists and religious pilgrims flock here every day. And although it's not among the Seven Wonders of the World, Colombia's Congress has proclaimed the Salt Cathedral the first wonder of Colombia. For NPR News, I'm John Otis in Zipaquira, Colombia.

1 Christians   

n.基督教徒( Christian的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• Christians of all denominations attended the conference. 基督教所有教派的人都出席了这次会议。
• His novel about Jesus caused a furore among Christians. 他关于耶稣的小说激起了基督教徒的公愤。

2 byline   

n.署名；v.署名

参考例句：

• His byline was absent as well.他的署名也不见了。
• We wish to thank the author of this article which carries no byline.我们要感谢这篇文章的那位没有署名的作者。

3 bowels   

n.肠，内脏，内部；肠( bowel的名词复数 )；内部，最深处

参考例句：

• Salts is a medicine that causes movements of the bowels. 泻盐是一种促使肠子运动的药物。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• The cabins are in the bowels of the ship. 舱房设在船腹内。 来自《简明英汉词典》

4 icons   

n.偶像( icon的名词复数 )；（计算机屏幕上表示命令、程序的）符号，图像

参考例句：

• Distinguish important text items in lists with graphic icons. 用图标来区分重要的文本项。 来自About Face 3交互设计精髓
• Daemonic icons should only be employed persistently if they provide continuous, useful status information. 只有会连续地提供有用状态信息的情况下，后台应用程序才应该一直使用图标。 来自About Face 3交互设计精髓

5 naves   

n.教堂正厅( nave的名词复数 )；本堂；中央部；车轮的中心部

参考例句：

• It's structured as a Latin cross with three naves divided by pillars. 教堂的形状更是以古老的拉丁十字为基础，内部由一根根地石柱隔成三条长廊。 来自互联网

6 dome   

n.圆屋顶，拱顶

参考例句：

• The dome was supported by white marble columns.圆顶由白色大理石柱支撑着。
• They formed the dome with the tree's branches.他们用树枝搭成圆屋顶。

7 illuminated   

adj.被照明的；受启迪的

参考例句：

• Floodlights illuminated the stadium. 泛光灯照亮了体育场。
• the illuminated city at night 夜幕中万家灯火的城市

8 splendor   

n.光彩；壮丽，华丽；显赫，辉煌

参考例句：

• Never in his life had he gazed on such splendor.他生平从没有见过如此辉煌壮丽的场面。
• All the splendor in the world is not worth a good friend.人世间所有的荣华富贵不如一个好朋友。

9 chapel   

n.小教堂，殡仪馆

参考例句：

• The nimble hero,skipped into a chapel that stood near.敏捷的英雄跳进近旁的一座小教堂里。
• She was on the peak that Sunday afternoon when she played in chapel.那个星期天的下午，她在小教堂的演出，可以说是登峰造极。

10 caverns   

大山洞，大洞穴( cavern的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• Within were dark caverns; what was inside them, no one could see. 里面是一个黑洞，这里面有什么东西，谁也望不见。 来自汉英文学 - 家（1-26） - 家（1-26）
• UNDERGROUND Under water grottos, caverns Filled with apes That eat figs. 在水帘洞里，挤满了猿争吃无花果。

11 exhausted   

adj.极其疲惫的，精疲力尽的

参考例句：

• It was a long haul home and we arrived exhausted.搬运回家的这段路程特别长，到家时我们已筋疲力尽。
• Jenny was exhausted by the hustle of city life.珍妮被城市生活的忙乱弄得筋疲力尽。

12 structural   

adj.构造的，组织的，建筑（用）的

参考例句：

• The storm caused no structural damage.风暴没有造成建筑结构方面的破坏。
• The North American continent is made up of three great structural entities.北美大陆是由三个构造单元组成的。

13 sculptors   

雕刻家，雕塑家( sculptor的名词复数 )； [天]玉夫座

参考例句：

• He is one of Britain's best-known sculptors. 他是英国最有名的雕塑家之一。
• Painters and sculptors are indexed separately. 画家和雕刻家被分开，分别做了索引。

14 dwindled   

v.逐渐变少或变小( dwindle的过去式和过去分词 )

参考例句：

• Support for the party has dwindled away to nothing. 支持这个党派的人渐渐化为乌有。
• His wealth dwindled to nothingness. 他的钱财化为乌有。 来自《简明英汉词典》