Greg Gangelhoff on the Absence of Religion in Public Life in France

By: Greg Gangelhoff

October 30, 2007

The presidential elections have come and gone; France chose the "Little Napoleon" over the socialist once labeled a "Lady in Red" by the Economist. In the months following the election, two important events have happened. First, Segolene Royal (the defeated Socialist) separated from her longtime partner, Francois Hollande (the head of the Socialist party in France). Second, President Nicolas Sarkozy and his wife, Cécilia, recently announced that they are now divorced, making Sarkozy the only president in the history of France to divorce while in office.

These two separations reveal a great deal about the role of religion in French politics. No essay on French politics and its intersection with religion would be complete without a mention of laïcité (the concept, embodied in a law in 1905, that strictly separates religion and the state). It is important to note that in France, religious marriage is completely divorced from legal marriage. The two events cannot happen in the same room: the civil marriage (the only one the state recognizes) is usually conducted at the mayor’s office (Hôtel de Ville), in a special "marriage room" reserved for the occasion; the religious marriage ceremony can occur anywhere else. When Eva Longoria married basketball superstar and French rapper Tony Parker, they did so twice: they were first married by the mayor of Paris, Bertrand Delanoë, followed the next day by a religious marriage in a Paris church.

I was not in France when Ms. Royal separated from Mr. Hollande, but it seems that Mr. Sarkozy's divorce has created more of a stir than her separation. As far as I can tell, there are two factors that explain this. First, Mr. Sarkozy is the president, and naturally garners more media attention in whatever he does. While Al Gore is often discussed in the news, he simply does not receive the same day-to-day coverage and attention that George W. Bush does. Second, French law offers a great deal of protection to sitting French presidents—in many cases, they cannot be prosecuted for crimes they commit while president until they have left office—so there is some debate as to whether any judge is legally entitled to divorce Mr. Sarkozy in a court of law. Christophe Barbier, the editor of L'Express, a weekly French newsmagazine equivalent to Time, called the debate over whether Sarkozy could be legally divorced "idiotic." The French reaction to Sarkozy’s divorce, however, reveals an important element of French political life.

While Mr. Sarkozy’s divorce may have been more of a bombshell than Ms. Royal’s separation, the two events reveal the extent to which religion has retreated from politics in France. There is a lively debate underway concerning whether people are too interested in the private lives of politicians. Some, such as the aforementioned editor of L'Express, wonder if the French have pushed their "democratic curiosity" too far into the private lives of politicians; it is all well and good to be interested in the personality of someone before they are elected, but to be interested in something as private as marriage is perhaps too far-reaching.

What is not debated, however, is whether Sarkozy or his ex-wife made a moral error in seeking a divorce. When I watched the news coverage of the divorce with my host family, my host parents lightheartedly explored all the wonderful things they could accomplish if they divorced. In a country in which churches hold more interest as historical sites than as religious ones for many people, religion doesn't hold quite the same sway over the private lives (or the public's voting decisions) of the French as it used to. The current debate concerns whether the French people have reached too far into the private lives of politicians, not whether churches have done so. After all, nearly half of all French marriages end in divorce, so it is not as though Mr. Sarkozy and Cécilia are miscreants in a country of saints.

I have found that in studying the intersection between religion and politics in France, it is often more useful to study the ways in which they don’t intersect, as opposed to when they do. Religion does enter into public debate: one example from many is the recent kerfuffle over whether Muslim girls should be allowed to wear the hijab to French public school, which explicitly forbids any outward displays of religious affiliation. Religion also has an effect on French life: millions of French citizens still dutifully attend Mass, even if attendance rates are on the decline. Insofar as politics enters into the daily lives of French citizens, however, religion doesn't seem to be more than an occasionally sticky thicket, or a private practice that doesn't rear its head to denounce the peculiarities of the living situation of the president or his defeated opponent.

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