Oh dear, I was afraid of that. We didn’t care much for Copenhagen.

Well, there’s nothing to say you have to make a love connection with everyplace you stop. And I don’t think it’s any reflection on Copenhagen. It’s breathtaking, bustling, full of life.

But the reason it wasn’t a hit with me is that it’s definitely a modern city. And like a lot of American Orthodox converts, I’ve got an ancient heart, or something like it. Bistros and ice bars don’t light my fire nearly as much as cathedrals and cobblestone pavement. So I’m the weirdo here.

Given the sheer coolness of Copenhagen, I should’ve been swept off my feet. Consider, for example, that the city provides racks of good sturdy bicycles for anyone to rent at any time for the cost of a small deposit. That’s just cool.

But that high cool factor, IMHO, comes at the expense of the grandeur, the classical beauty, the weight of the ages that the city must’ve once had. I walked into a door of the historic Christenborg church, that had a medievel stone sculpture of a saint blessing me, only to find that they’d converted it into a modern art museum — a move that I would think wouldn’t please modern art aficionados or church-goers.

But then, Copenhagen probably didn’t have that many church-goers to worry about. Denmark is often called the most secular nation in the world. Recent surveys have found out that the Danish aren’t particularly inclined toward atheism more out of apathy than anything else. They don’t mind the idea of prayer and church because those things can no longer give any offense. And at the point that Christianity can give no offense, it likely can’t give much of anything else. If a person is beyond reckoning sin to themselves or anyone else, I suppose they have entered a twilight place where a lot of things don’t matter.

So I couldn’t relate to them, and that’s the bias I have to admit to. A final anecdote sums up my problems.

Finding myself with a couple hours at the end of the day, I decided to go see the Little Mermaid statue that has become such an iconic symbol of Copenhagen. (Didn’t have a camera with me, but HERE’s a link if you don’t know the one I mean.) From the dock I set out following the wide cobblestone sidewalks of the coast around the Baltic sea. It was fine weather and there were lots of fellow pedestrians out (no skateboarders or rollerbladers, by the way, now that I think of it.) Halfway to the statue, I came across a newer, bigger version of the mermaid on the rock than the one everyone is used to seeing. A plaque anounced that the sculptor had wanted something “more contemporary and more natural.”

More natural? For a mermaid? What does that mean? Well, in this sculptors opinion, it apparently meant that she should look like a movie star showing off her new boob job. Because she was big and buxom and had her chest and her butt thrown out in that saucy way we see in all the ads for designer jeans and perfume. The statue looked like something that belonged in front of a Hooters restaurant down by the docks.

I pushed on another half mile and got to the original mermaid statue. She looked small and unimpressive by comparison, almost lonely in spite of the tourists crawling all over her like ants, getting in close to have their picture taken, throwing an arm around her, waving and smiling, feeding her ice cream. She sat on a rock, naked but not at all voluptuous. Just looking over her shoulder, lost in melancholy thoughts.

That’s what need improving on. That was what had to be thrown over for something more contemporary. And “natural” whatever that means under the circumstances.

So I’m for the old, original, classic mermaid … against the modern, gaudy, unsubtle mermaid. Now I know something about me and Copenhagen.