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De-Christianization

The phenomenon of de-Christianization produced some unusual spectacles during the radical stage of the French Revolution. This selection from the minutes of the National Convention describes how the cathedral of Notre Dame was put to new use as the Temple of Reason.

The Temple of Reason

A member puts in the form of a motion the demand of the citizens of Paris that the metropolitan cathedral [Notre Dame] be henceforth the Temple of Reason.

A member requests that the goddess of Reason place herself at the side of the president.

The attorney of the Commune conducts her to the desk. The president and the secretaries give her the fraternal kiss in the midst of applause.

She sits at the side of the president.

A member demands that the National Convention march in a body, in the midst of the People, to the Temple of Reason to sing the hymn of Liberty there.

This proposal is passed.

The Convention marches with the People to the Temple of Reason in the midst of general enthusiasm and joyful acclamations.

Having entered the Temple of Reason, they sing the following hymn:

Descend, O Liberty, daughter of Nature:

The People have recaptured their immortal power;

Over the pompous remains of age-old imposture

Their hands raise thine altar.

Come, vanquisher of kings, Europe gazes upon you;

Come, vanquish the false gods.

Thou, holy Liberty, come dwell in this temple;

Be the goddess of the French.

Thy countenance rejoices the most savage mountain,

Amid the rocks harvests grow:

Embellished by thy hands, the harshest coast,

Embedded in ice, smiles.

Thou doublest pleasures, virtues, genius;

Under thy holy standards, man is always victorious;

Before knowing thee he does not know life;

He is created by thy glance.

All kings make war on the sovereign People;

Let them henceforth fall at thy feet, O goddess;

Soon on the coffins of the world’s tyrants the world’s peoples will swear peace.

Warrior liberators, powerful, brave race,

Armed with a human sword, sanctify terror;

Brought down by your blows,may the last slave

Follow the last king to the grave.

What was the purpose of de-Christianization? Based on the ceremony described here, how effective do you think it was?

* * *

Yet another manifestation of de-Christianization was the adoption of a new republican calendar on October 5, 1793. Years would no longer be numbered from the birth of Jesus but from September 22, 1792, the day the French Republic was proclaimed. Thus, at the time the calendar was adopted, the French were already living in year II. The calendar contained twelve months; each month consisted of three ten-day weeks called decades (day-KAD) with the tenth day of each week a rest day (decadi). This eliminated Sundays and Sunday worship services and put an end to the ordering of French lives by a Christian calendar that emphasized Sundays, saints’ days, and church holidays and festivals. Religious celebrations were to be replaced by revolutionary festivals. Especially important were the five days (six in leap years) left over in the calendar at the end of the year. These days were to form a half-week of festivals to celebrate the revolutionary virtues—Virtue, Intelligence, Labor, Opinion, and Rewards. The sixth extra day in a leap year would be a special festival day when French citizens would “come from all parts of the Republic to celebrate liberty and equality, to cement by their embraces the national fraternity.” Of course, ending church holidays also reduced the number of nonworking holidays from fifty-six to thirty-two, a goal long recommended by eighteenth-century economic theorists.

The calendar’s anti-Christian purpose was also apparent in the renaming of the months of the year. The months were given names that were supposed to evoke the seasons, the temperature, or the state of the vegetation: Vendémiaire (vahnh-duh-MYAYR) (harvest—the first month of thirty days beginning September 22), Brumaire (broo-MAYR) (mist), Frimaire (free-MAYR) (frost), Nivôse (nee-VOHZ)