lecture 5, "religion in france"
john merriman

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OVERVIEW

until 1960, the vast majority of the french population was born catholic (whether they practiced, different question)

protestant population about 5%; jewish population around 300,000 -- when the reformation expanded from geneva (where john calvin had influence), it spread down the rone (sp.?) river, down to lyon. as such, large sections of the south of france are still protestant (lots also in alsace and lorrance(sp?)).

when the edict of nantes is revoked in 1685 (which tolerated protestantism), lots fled (to canada, to amsterdam, to the very south-west coast).

and then you have protestants in paris and other big cities.

the first synagogue in france is also located in the south, large concentrations of sephardic jews in bourdeaux, paris, and alsace.

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because of the role of the church in the counter-revolution and its close association with the monarchy, you have a tension between the church as a public institution and the increasingly powerful state.

one distinction that's critical: de-christianization vs. anti-clericalism (i.e., there's a distinction between opposition to religiosity, and opposition to the public role of the catholic church in politics).

in french cities in 1880s and 1890s, there are literal battles over urban space. municipalities seeking to limit the rights of the catholic church to stage processions on feast days. again, not necessarily anti-religion, but opposition to the public role of the catholic church.

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about 50 years ago, one of the interpretations of the french revolution and first empire (napoleon the first) that was popular was that it killed the old-time religion. after 1815, there's a revival of religiosity in some regions (same thing you see in the 1870s: republic of the moral order).

however, michelle vovelle advocates an alternative reading: he was interested in seeing whether that old-time religion was already crumbling before the french revolution. he started asking: just how effective was the counter-reformation (17th century) in reviving that baroque piety (a religion of faith, of intense religious belief)? and he discovered that the parts of france he looked at showed that old-time religion was already waning.

and thus we come to the concept of de-christianization--means two things: (1) the campaign against the church as a public institution--melting down church bells, only priests who swore alleigance to the french nation could say mass, etc. the remnants of that are still important, of course. (2) the decline in religious practice. it's hard, of course, for a historian to prove this that religion has a declining role in individual life. vovelle looked at baptism certificates, to see how long passed between birth and baptism. vovelle found the time increasing. he looked also at wills: before people, during the counter-reformation, had been leaving money to catholic authorities, but it was happening less and less during the time leading up to the revolution. and, you have a precipitious decline, even, of the number of people attending church on easter.

at the same time: is this true everywhere? no, there are huge differences, geographically. the revolution, in this sense, was a civil war over religion. one of the predictors of political conservatism, even today, are regions that were less de-christianized than others.

(prof now giving overview of more religious vs. less religious regions--begins at about 22 mins in)

most big cities, with the exception of lyons, were lost to the church. BUT it's not just urban centers--there are whole regions de-christianized: the south-west, provance, etc., etc.

in fairness, this may be overly pessimistic--there are accounts of scattered revivalist movements, via miracle sightings of the virgin mary, etc. for the church: "all the news is not bad, but most of it is"

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moving foward: in 1905, the church and the state are declared separate (in 1906, they did inventories of all the church's art; in many cases, people barricaded themselves in the church to prevent the inspector from entering--ultimately, resolved by people with axes blowing open the church doors).

by 1905/1906, in the wake of the dreyfus affair (where they went after dreyfus), you have a rallying of the church to the republic as an institution (but things weren't quite better, you have these series of barricades to prevent troops assisting these people taking inventories).

in sum: in areas that were not de-christianized, the process of separation of church and state was extraordinarily wrenching.