The Basilica of the Sacred Heart of Montmartre (), commonly known as Sacré-Cœur Basilica () or simply Sacré-Cœur (, pronounced ), is a Catholic church and minor basilica in Paris dedicated to the Sacred Heart of Jesus.
Sacré-Cœur Basilica is located at the summit of the butte of Montmartre. From its dome two hundred meters above the Seine, the basilica overlooks the entire city of Paris and its suburbs. It is the second most popular tourist destination in the capital after the Eiffel Tower.
The basilica was first proposed by the former Bishop of Nantes, Felix Fournier, in 1870, after France's defeat and Napoleon III's capture at the Battle of Sedan in the Franco-Prussian War. Attributing the defeat to the country's moral decline since the French Revolution, he proposed a new Parisian church dedicated to the Sacred Heart of Jesus. Although early proposals were discussed some months before the Paris Commune, its prominent hilltop location—overlooking the site of the uprising—was only built upon after the Commune's defeat, making it continuously controversial among some of the French left-wing, who view it as a symbol of the violent repression of the Communards.
The basilica was designed by Paul Abadie, whose neo-Byzantine-Romanesque plan was selected from among seventy-seven proposals. Construction began in 1875 and continued for forty years under five different architects. Completed in 1914, the basilica was formally consecrated in 1919 after World War I. It was formally approved as a monument historique on 8 December 2022."Ouest-France", "Le Sacré-Coeur à Paris classé monument historique", 12 October 2022
Sacré-Cœur Basilica has maintained perpetual adoration of the Holy Eucharist since 1885. The site is traditionally associated with the martyrdom of Saint Denis, the patron saint of Paris."Le Sacre-Coeur – Monument Historique? Polemique en Vue." by Baudouin Eschapasse, "Le Point" magazine, 14 October 2020
History
Proposal The proposal to build a new Parisian church dedicated to the Sacred Heart of Jesus was first made on 4 September 1870, by Felix Fournier, the Bishop of Nantes, following the defeat of France and the capture of Emperor Napoleon III by the Prussians at the Battle of Sedan in the Franco-Prussian War. Until his death in 1877, Fournier was an active builder who completed the long-delayed restoration of Nantes Cathedral. He wrote that the defeat of France in 1870 was a divine punishment for the moral decline of the country since the French Revolution.
In January 1871, Fournier was joined by the philanthropist Alexandre Legentil, who was a follower of Frédéric Ozanam, the founder of the Society of Saint Vincent de Paul. Legentil declared that France had been justly punished for its sins by the defeat of the French Army at Sedan and the imprisonment of the Pope in Italy by Italian nationalists. He wrote, We recognize that we were guilty and justly punished. To make honourable amends for our sins, and to obtain the infinite mercy of the Sacred Heart of our Lord Jesus Christ and the pardon of our sins, as well as extraordinary aid which alone can delivery our sovereign Pontiff from captivity and reverse the misfortune of France, we promise to contribute to the erection in Paris of a sanctuary dedicated to the Sacred Heart of Jesus. The influence of Legentil led to a successful fundraising campaign based entirely on private contributions.
Site Montmartre was selected as the site of the new basilica due to its prominent height and visibility from many parts of the city and for its association with Saint Denis of Paris. Since the location included land belonging to the local government as well as private owners, the French parliament assisted in securing the site by declaring that the construction of the basilica was in the national interest.Harvey it said "Monument and Myth" 1979, pp 380–81 . In July 1873, the proposal was finally brought forward and approved in the National Assembly with the official statement that "it was necessary to efface by this work of expiation the crimes which have crowned our sorrows."Harvey, David, "Memorial and Myth" (1979), p. 369 The groundbreaking for the new church finally took place in 1875.
Apart from its physical attributes, Montmartre or the "Hill of the Martyrs" was also chosen for its association with the early Christian church. According to tradition, it was the place where the patron saint of Paris, Saint Denis of Paris, was beheaded by the Romans. His tomb became the site of the Basilica of Saint Denis, the traditional resting place for the kings of France until the French Revolution.
In addition, Montmartre was the birthplace of the Society of Jesus, one of the largest and most influential religious orders in the history of the Catholic Church. In 1534, Ignatius of Loyola and a few of his followers made their vows in Saint-Pierre de Montmartre, one of the oldest churches in Paris. The church survived the Revolution although the Montmartre Abbey to which it belonged was destroyed.Rustenholtz, Alain, "Traversées de Paris" (2010), p. 376-387
Construction
A competition was held for the design of the basilica and attracted seventy-seven proposals. Architect Paul Abadie was selected,The competition was commemorated in Souvenir du Concours de l’Église du Sacré-Cœur (Paris: J. Le Clere) 1874. and the cornerstone finally laid on 16 June 1875.Harvey "Monument and Myth" 1979, pp 380–81 .
The early construction was delayed and complicated by unstable foundations. Eighty-three wells, each thirty meters deep, had to be dug under the site and filled with rock and concrete to serve as subterranean pillars supporting the basilica."Dictionnaire Historique de Paris" (2013), p. 684 Construction costs, estimated at 7 million francs drawn entirely from private donors, were expended before any above-ground structure became visible. A provisional chapel was consecrated on 3 March 1876, and pilgrimage quickly brought in additional funding.In 1877, its first full year of operation, over 240,000 francs was collected, and the figure doubled the following year. (Jonas 1993:495).
Not long after the foundation was completed in 1884, Abadie died and was succeeded by five other architects who made extensive modifications: Honoré Daumet (1884–1886), Jean-Charles Laisné (1886–1891), Henri-Pierre-Marie Rauline (1891–1904), Lucien Magne (1904–1916), and Jean-Louis Hulot (1916–1924).
During construction, opponents of the basilica were relentless in their effort to hinder its progress. In 1882, the walls of the church were barely above its foundations when the left-wing coalition led by Georges Clemenceau won the parliamentary election. Clemenceau immediately proposed halting the work, and the parliament blocked all further funding for the project. However, faced with enormous liabilities of twelve million francs from project cancellation, the government had to allow the construction to proceed.
In 1891, the interior of the basilica was completed, dedicated and opened for public worship. Still, in 1897, Clemenceau made another attempt to block its completion in the parliament, but his motion was overwhelmingly defeated since the cancellation of the project would require repaying thirty million francs to eight million people who had contributed to its construction.
The dome of the church was completed in 1899, and the bell tower finished in 1912. The basilica was completed in 1914 and formally dedicated in 1919 after World War I.
Sociopolitical controversiality
Criticism of the church by leftist journalists and politicians for its alleged connection with the destruction of the Paris Commune has been continuously espoused since the 19th century. In 1898, Emile Zola wrote sarcastically, France is guilty. It must do penitence. Penitence for what? For the Revolution, for a century of free speech and science, and emancipated reason... for that they built this gigantic landmark that Paris can see from all of its streets, and cannot be seen without feeling misunderstood and injured.Dictionnaire Historique de Paris (2013), p. 684 Shortly after the completed Statue of Liberty was transported from France to the United States, opponents of Sacré-Cœur came up with a new strategy. They proposed installing a full-size copy of the Statue of Liberty on top of Montmartre, directly in front of the basilica, which would entirely block the view of the church. This idea was eventually dropped as expensive and impractical.Harvey, David, Memorial and Myth (1979), p. 379
A bomb was exploded inside the church in 1976.Monument and Myth, 1979, pp 380–81
To make their feelings about the church clear, in 2004 the socialist mayor of Paris Bertrand Delanoë and the mayor of the 18th arrondissement Daniel Vaillant, also member of the Socialist Party, renamed the square in front of and below the church in honor of Louise Michel, the prominent anarchist and participant in the Paris Commune.
Lionel Jospin, socialist Prime Minister between 1997 and 2002 also expressed his wish that the basilica be demolished as a symbol of "obscurantism, bad taste and reactionism."« Un square Louise-Michel sur la butte Montmartre » , www.leparisien.fr, 28 février 2004 (consulté le 18 octobre 2018).« Pourquoi veut-on la peau du Sacré-Cœur ? »
In 2021, to avoid celebrating the church's history in the same year as the 150th anniversary of the Paris Commune, leftist members of the French parliament blocked a measure to declare the church a monument historique (national historic monument) and postponed it until 2022."Pourquoi veut-on la peau du Sacré-Cœur?" Liberation, 27 February 2017
The church was finally named as a national historic monument by a unanimous vote of the National Commission of Patrimony and Architecture on 8 December 2022. This decision was immediately criticized by the leftist politician Jean-Luc Mélenchon, who called it "a glorification of the assassination of 32,000 Paris Communards shot in just 8 days".Ouest-France, "Le Sacré-Coeur à Paris classé monument historique", 10 December 2022. Recent historians put the number of Communards killed in combat or executed afterwards at between ten to fifteen thousand men, and the basilica was proposed before the Paris Commune took place.(See Paris Commune)
Voices on the French left have since have continued their opposition to the designation, as, for the time a building is listed as such, it cannot be demolished or significantly modified.
Description The church is 85 meters long and thirty-five metres wide. It is composed of a large central rotunda, around which are placed a small nave, two transepts, and an advance-choir, which form a cross. The porch of the church has three bays, and is modelled after the porch of Périgueux Cathedral. The dominant feature is the immense elongated ovoid cupola, 83.33 metres high, surrounded by four smaller cupolas. At the north end is the campanile, or bell tower, 84 metres high, containing the "Savoyarde", the largest bell in France."Dictionnaire Historique de Paris", p. 684
The overall style of the structure is a free interpretation of Romano-Byzantine architecture. This was an unusual architectural style at the time, and was in part a reaction against the neo-Baroque of the Palais Garnier opera house by Charles Garnier, and other buildings of the Napoleon III style.Legentil had wanted to demolish Garnier's half-built opera house and build the church on the site of that "scandalous monument of extravagance, indecency and bad taste" (Harvey "Monument and Myth" 1979, P376 ). The construction was eventually handed on to a series of new architects, including Garnier himself, who was a counsellor to the architect Henri-Pierre Rauline between 1891 and 1904,