2023-04-23 09:00:18
The Church owns thousands of properties throughout France: not only churches and chapels, but also buildings and hotels, occupied by congregations or devoted to religious education, for example. This heritage is estimated at 6.5 billion euros, as recently revealed by the program “Complément d’Enquête” (January 19, 2023).
In total, the real estate held by the Church in France “would cover more than 100,000 buildings”written by Michel Turin, author of Sacred business. The Incredible Clergy Real Estate Market (Robert Laffont, 222 pages, 19.50 euros). But if the management of this heritage has become largely professional, it remains threatened with “third extinction”says the economic journalist.
Why do you think that the real estate heritage of the Church of France is threatened?
It is in any case strongly in decline since the French Revolution. Until the XVIIIe century, about two thirds of the Parisian land stock belonged to the Church of France! But the State confiscated or nationalized a large part of the property of the clergy in the wake of the Revolution, then of the passage of the law of 1905 on the separation of Churches and State – all the churches built before this date are thus owned by municipalities or local authorities.
The decline has continued until today: after the Second World War, the Church only owned 4% or 5% of the buildings in Paris. And today, it owns less than 3% of the capital’s land holdings.
After the Revolution of 1789 and the 1905 law, you speak today of a “third extinction” of this heritage… What does that mean?
The decrease in religious practice has cascading consequences. Congregations no longer attract. Some sisters or monks find themselves in huge monasteries or convents that are expensive to maintain.
Selling therefore quickly appears to them as the only solution, especially since real estate developers are showing interest. The property of the Church is prestigious and easy to value. Some promoters even make agreements with congregations to acquire them, even if it means allowing them to remain on site.
For the Church, this also represents a cash inflow.
Absolutely, especially since the proceeds of these sales are often used to finance the development of Catholicism abroad, especially in new lands of evangelization, in Africa for example. In other words, the money leaves the spaces where the practice is at half mast to go where it is more dynamic. It is a good indicator of the state of health of the Church throughout the world. Moreover, members of congregations also tend to migrate in the same way.
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