Paris’s famous Sacre-Coeur basilica – long a symbol of division between Catholics and republicans who pushed for a separation between church and state – is to be listed as an "historic monument" after years of controversy.
Paris councillors on Tuesday gave the green light for the state to grant the famous basilica historical recognition, which gives it the highest level of protection and allows for the financing of possible works.
While the French capital began a campaign in 2011 to protect its 96 religious buildings, it’s taken 11 years for it to request a listing for Sacre-Coeur.
At the top of the Montmartre hill in the north of Paris, the 85-metre white stone structure, built in the Roman-Byzantine style, is a must-see for tourists, with nearly 11 million visitors each year.
Sensitive history
After Notre-Dame, it’s the second most visited monument in the capital. However Sacre-Coeur has a sensitive history.
Its construction, which began in 1875, is associated with the massacre of the Communards – members of the short-lived Paris Commune, a government formed in the wake of the French defeat in the Franco-Prussian War.
During the war, the ruling classes had escaped Paris and were in Versailles, allowing the Communards to take power for a short period from March 18 to May 28, 1871.
"The building carries the opinion of a politically very divisive fringe, the ultra-Catholics who want to quell a neighbourhood deemed insurrectionary in the northeast of Paris, but also atone for the Commune of 1871 as well as all the revolutions since 1789,” Eric Fournier, lecturer at the Sorbonne University, told AFP.
Opposition
The move to list Sacre-Coeur as an "historic monument" came despite opposition from Communist Party councillors, who argue the classification is “an affront” to the memory of the 32,000 murdered Communards.
"The decision appears to be a new burial of this revolution," said Sylvie Braibant, co-president of the NGO Friends of the Paris Commune.
The classification will pave the way for the Regional Directorate of Cultural Affairs to fund up to 40 percent of improvement works on the basilica.
"Even if history has been turbulent, we cannot remain with a backward-looking vision of things,” said Sacre-Coeur’s rector, Father Stéphane Esclef.
“We must move forward and see that this place is now emblematic.”
