The world held its breath five years ago as one of the most famous and beloved churches in the world, the Cathedral of Notre-Dame de Paris, burnt to a shell of its former self. Now a global audience has followed the remarkable work of its reconstruction.
American Catholics may have wondered about the seemingly outsized hand the French government has played in the restoration. The country’s president, Emmanuel Macron, gave the final approval for the design of the reconstruction, which was then overseen by a general of the French army. He was also the one to invite the pope to the reopening on Dec. 7, and Mr. Macron first announced that he would give a formal address inside the cathedral that weekend, though it was later decided to move the president’s speech outside.
It all points to the unique and counterintuitive fact that Notre-Dame, and many churches in France, are owned by the state and merely used by the church.
Hélène de Lauzun, a French historian, explained to America that there are two key events to understanding the unique relationship between church and state in France: the French Revolution in 1789 and the closely linked Civil Constitution of the Clergy in 1790. The first marks the violent beginning of the end of the French monarchy and its Catholic confessional state, and the emergence of the French Republic.
As the anti-religious and anti-clerical revolutionaries took control of the government, they outlawed religious life, forcibly closed monasteries and convents, and attempted to control the clergy. Only priests and bishops who agreed to an oath of loyalty to the new regime were permitted under state law to continue their ministry.
In 1790, the revolutionary government appropriated all of the church’s property—then a considerable amount of real estate—and used it to pay the government’s debts. Many churches and monasteries were destroyed, abandoned or turned into barns, armories or military barracks.
Then, in 1801, Napoleon Bonaparte came to power. He was famously crowned emperor of France in Notre-Dame. (French kings had traditionally been crowned in the Cathedral of Reims.) He also signed a concordat—a formal agreement between the Vatican and a government—allowing the church to resume its normal functions in France and reclaim many of its properties. Religious life was legalized. The 19th century proved a welcome period of recovery for the Catholic Church, Ms. de Lauzun said.
But the beginning of the 20th century marked another swing toward aggressive secularization and a government strongly hostile to church and faith. The question of who should own and administer church property was renewed with the passage of a law, in 1905, establishing laïcité, or state secularization. A bitter struggle between the church and the state resulted in a breakdown of diplomatic relations between the Holy See and France, a struggle that reverberated across French society. The government proposed establishing state structures to administer church property and carried out inventories to appraise the value of the church’s holdings. The most radical voices in the government wanted to transform some churches into places for secular activities—buildings for general public use, or headquarters of trade unions and stock exchanges, Ms. de Lauzun said. These efforts by the state met strong resistance from French Catholics, some of whom died in the fight to protect their churches from desacralization.
In the end, the pope and the French bishops offered the government an arrangement that created local lay-based associations connected to the hierarchy to own and administer church buildings. All parties agreed to a compromise: The state could own churches built before 1905 but had to provide financially for their upkeep and allow them to be used freely and without cost by the church.
According to Ms. de Lauzun, the 1905 law is often lauded as an expression of a balanced form of secularism, but at the time Catholics experienced it as a traumatic sacking of the church by the state. The rights of the church were not fully clarified and respected until after World War I.
According to Francoise Euve, S.J., editor of the French Jesuit journal Étude, the drive for secularization affected religious orders like the Jesuits as well. According to the new law, religious communities had to register with the state, a requirement with which many refused to comply. Not having registered, the Jesuits were forced off their properties and had to close their schools, including their seminary in Paris. During those first decades of the 20th century, they lived in small groups in regular residential housing. Other religious orders went through similar trials.
These tensions and restrictions were not resolved until 1924, Ms. de Lauzun explained. She believes one reason the bishops agreed to state ownership of older churches was that they knew they could not afford their maintenance.
Father Euve adds that these old churches, many of them parish churches, had been built and maintained by the people for centuries, not owned or controlled administratively by the bishop.
“The churches were built by the French citizens. They belong to the French people,” he said.
In some sense, then, the present arrangement reflects this tradition. Father Euve points out another seemingly incongruous role of the French secular state that follows a similar philosophy. The state pays teachers’ salaries at private schools, including Catholic schools, because the general education work of Catholic schools is considered a public service.
The church-state arrangement can be a double-edged sword, Ms. de Luazun said. As church attendance falls, she worries the state could use declining enrollment figures as an excuse to stop maintaining some churches, particularly in rural areas where population loss has left churches increasingly empty.
“Thanks to God, in a way, in France, the state is paying for [church upkeep],” she told America. “But the problem is that if we no longer have Masses, which is the case in many churches in the countryside, is the government going to pay for buildings that are not used for worship anymore? That’s a big problem.”
Ms. de Lauzun also explained that this situation of state ownership and funding for Notre-Dame provided the context for Mr. Macron’s proposal to speak inside the church as part of the reopening.
“That’s why there is such a strong pressure from Emmanuel Macron [to speak at the reopening] because, well, he did the job. He rebuilt the cathedral in five years. Not in three days, of course—he’s not the Lord—but he’s very proud of that,” she said, adding that highlighting this accomplishment has obvious political advantages.
In the end, Mr. Macron backed down from speaking inside the cathedral, but Ms. de Lauzun said it shows how the church is “constantly negotiating” with the state. As another example, any changes to the physical structure of the church must be approved by the ministry of culture, and sometimes the archbishop and the government disagree.
This tension is still playing out at Notre-Dame, Ms. de Lauzun noted, around the stained glass windows. Some new windows of contemporary design are slated for installation in 2026. The initiative came from the archbishop of Paris, Laurant Ulrich, who proposed it diplomatically in a formal letter. The stained glass windows, which are already a mix of works from various centuries, were not broken in the fire, but the prelate wanted something new to mark the incredible restoration of the cathedral.
The French National Commission for Heritage and Architecture, the advisory body to the ministry of culture regarding the preservation of historic buildings, came out against the idea. Mr. Macron, however, sided with the archbishop, and the government is accepting proposals for a series of windows depicting Pentecost. Ms. de Lauzun is curious to see if in the end the more preservation-minded attitude of the state prevails.
The rebuilding of Notre-Dame has also stirred up the question of whether or not to charge an entrance fee to see the church—a proposal that the archdiocese has steadfastly resisted. Undoubtedly, debates of this kind between church and state will continue to brew.
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