The plan to build a new Parisian church dedicated to the Sacred Heart of Jesus was first proposed on September 4, 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.[1]

 

Alexandre Legentil (photo by Nadar)

In January 1871, Bishop Fournier was joined by the philanthropist Alexandre Legentil, who was a follower of Frederic 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.[1]

Montmartre was selected as the site of the new basilica due to its prominent height and visibility from many parts of the city. 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.[2] 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."[3] 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.[4] The church survived the Revolution although the Montmartre Abbey to which it belonged was destroyed.[5]

 

Construction of Sacré-Cœur underway (1882)

 

Construction of Sacré-Cœur (1897)

 

The funicular railway to Sacré-Cœur (about 1905)

A competition was held for the design of the basilica and attracted seventy-seven proposals. Architect Paul Abadie was selected, [6] and the cornerstone finally laid on June 16, 1875.[7]

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.[8] 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 March 3, 1876, and pilgrimage quickly brought in additional funding.[9]

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.[7]

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.[7]

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.

 

The Basilica of Sacré-Cœur, main entrance

Criticism of the church by leftist journalists and politicians for its alleged connection with the destruction of the Paris Commune continued from the late 19th century into the 20th and 21st centuries, even though the church had been proposed before the Paris Commune took place. 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."[10]

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.[11]

A bomb was exploded inside the church in 1976.[12] To make the government opposition to the church clear, the socialist prime minister Lionel Jospin in 2004 renamed the square in front of and below the church for Louise Michel, the prominent anarchist and participant in the Paris Commune. He expressed his wish that the basilica be demolished as a symbol of "obscurantism, bad taste and reactionism."[13]

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 national historic monument and postponed it until 2022.[14]

The church was finally named as a national historic monument by a unanimous vote of the National Commission of Patrimony and Architecture on December 8, 2022.This decision was immediately attacked by the leftist politician Jean-Luc Mélenchon, who called it "an apology for the 32,000 Paris Communards shot during eight days."[15].