Last December, La Croix published a rich investigation into contemporary Catholicism in France. It shows a group becoming a minority, within which the prescriptive power of the clerics has diminished.
It also shows that believers are scattered into varied practices and beliefs and that the doctrinal corpus seems increasingly foreign to the common culture. This unprecedented change requires French Catholicism to reinvent its internal management as much as its mode of presence in the world. Despite a dissimilar context, the Sillon experience may seem useful for this double challenge.
Le Sillon is an original and pioneering youth movement led, from 1899 to 1910, by a brilliant personality, Marc Sangnier. Through the education of the masses, he sought to bring about a democratic feeling, which would make it possible to overcome the violent antagonisms between anticlerical republicans and Catholics on the one hand, and between the social elite and the working world on the other.
The test of divided Catholicism
Initially of Catholic identity and supported by the hierarchy, the movement expanded to welcome people “of good will”, believers or not. His political positioning – too democratic – and ecclesiological – based on the autonomy of the laity – earned him a public disavowal from Pope Pius X in 1910, which put an end to the adventure.
If this episode can still inspire Catholics, it is because Marc Sangnier also experienced a divided Catholicism, marked by a monarchist movement, Action Française, which then led a cultural battle in order to assimilate the defense of Catholicism with that of reactionary and exclusionary values.
To combat it, the Sillon sets the example of a strong commitment, but respectful of the opponent as well as the referee. The fight was waged through words and through argument, with respect for his opponents.
On the other hand, Sangnier placed it under the authority of the Church; he who had engaged in public action when the Roman encyclicals called on the faithful to accept the republican framework and to refuse liberalism like socialism, immediately submitted to the papacy when it asked him to renounce it.
And yet: from 1916, Benedict XV encouraged him to resume his educational activities, in 1926 Pius The story of Le Sillon reminds us of the risk that any institution runs in favoring the defense of its internal logic and its authority at the expense of discernment and charity.
The role of youth
Another form of topicality of the Sillon is due to the fact that it relied on a few communities which seem to be the anchor points or vitality of current Catholicism. First and foremost on the youth who were its target audience.
Today it is within it that we find the most marked signs of a stirring of Catholic recovery, whether in the number of baptisms and confirmations, the attendance at pilgrimages and religious gatherings, the appetite for fasting or for rules of life. We must work so that the confused need for absolutes, benchmarks and experiences results in the construction of structured and responsible personalities, aware of the human and spiritual issues of their time, to which the latest encyclicals alert.
To these young people, the Sillon offered a space of expression and sociability then without equivalent, conducive to realizing their social value and forming their conscience, before acting in the public sphere, rather than retreating into the private or community sphere.
Create a friendship that goes beyond social origins
At the same time he brought together the social elite and the working classes. Here we find two social groups in which Catholicism is maintained less poorly today than elsewhere: the first because it ensures a better transmission of a Catholic habitus, the second thanks to migratory or overseas contributions.
Enabling them to meet and collaborate in an equal manner remains a challenge, due to a certain predisposition to overbearing inherited from some and a form of self-censorship from others.
Here again, the Sillon was able to generate a framework of camaraderie – a “friendship” it was said – aimed at going beyond social origins to experience, on an equal footing, times of collective fervor, religious activities, moments of analysis and reflection, learning through militant action.
Seek dialogue with non-Catholics
Finally, throughout its brief existence the movement has constantly sought dialogue and even collaboration with non-Catholics.
The current retraction of the Catholic community is accompanied in places by a propensity towards radicalism and the search for visibility in worship, in daily behavior or in public remarks. It is perhaps a posture adapted to a secularized world. There is certainly a risk of causing incomprehension, derision or even rejection.
If this were to happen, the Sillon also traces a path of action. Faced with attacks and anticlerical public policies, he mobilized crowds, led media campaigns, and – rather than regretting a past time or defending privileges – demonstrated that his adversaries contradicted their own values, democratic principles – starting with religious freedom – or the cause of the people.
Choosing, like the Sillon, integration into one’s time without renouncing one’s religious identity is a demanding path but one which proved prophetic. This is undoubtedly the last lesson of Marc Sangnier, that of the need for continuous and tenacious action, driven by hope and dedication, despite disappointments, he who said: “I am used to throwing seeds in the furrows but the plowman who puts the grain in the ground often dies before summer. »
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