Visible Faith in a Hidden World: What Small Town France Reminded Me About Living Faith Boldly

As most of you know, my community of priests, the Vincentians, was founded by St. Vincent de Paul in Paris, France, where we still have a large house in the city centre we call our “motherhouse”, and all of us are welcome to visit and stay. We have our shrine there of St. Vincent DePaul and around the corner is the Daughters of Charity Miraculous Medal chapel—where the Blessed Mother appeared to Catherine Laboure.

Cycling Through the Catholic Heart of Rural France

So when I get the opportunity to visit I always pad the time with an extra week or so so I can rent a bike and spend 7 or 8 days pedaling my way through villages and towns in the south of France—which I have done many times. No big cities, just small rural communities connected by incredible scenery and old, old houses and churches that have been there for hundreds of years. And because it’s France almost all of the churches are Catholic (and surprisingly, open) and every village, no matter how small or isolated, has one! They are almost always located in the center of the town and you can see the steeple from miles away. Nothing in the entire town compares in size or beauty to their church. Its one of the highlights of doing these rides, to see and visit these beautiful, ancient houses of prayer that have drawn together people in faith for hundreds of years. Made of stone, from floor to ceiling, almost always with colorful stained glass and old, creaky wooden pews. The smell is must and traces of incense and beeswax is the first thing that hits you as walk through the doors into the darkened, cool nave. You just want to kneel in prayer.

Everything in the town—from houses to shops to butchers to schools and playgrounds-- radiate out from the church. In many cases, it is the first thing that was built upon the founding of the town, often at great expense. If you want to know where the heart of any rural French town is, just look for a steeple. Their faith in God and being Catholic is such a fundamental part of who and what they are, and it shows.

In addition to the church, I started noticing the coolest thing as I biked into (and then out of) many of these villages along the main road.  Large crosses made out of stone or ornate iron surrounded by a bed of flowers greeted people as they drove in (or biked, in my case!). If not a cross--then it is a shrine to the Blessed Mother, which looks like a tiny, mini church made out of rock with an iron grill in the front where you can look in and see her surrounded with candles and flowers. In either case, they are bold and unmistakable in their profession and everyone travelling in or out of town are visibly reminded of who they are and what they’re about.

In addition to that, oftentimes, high up on the roofline corners of buildings of the village are small recesses or platforms that hold a statue of a saint looking down for everyone to pray to as they walk by. Whether it’s a bank building or the town’s butcher shop, look up and you’ll probably see the town’s patron saint or the infant of Prague looking down. It’s something so foreign to me in the United States where we have a separation between church and state; faith and public living. Your religion is something private and its expression should follow suit. Crosses welcoming you into town and mini shrines to the Blessed Mother on the side of the road would be laughable to consider in America. Can you imagine walking downtown and seeing statues of Catholic saints on the sides of buildings?!

Which brings me back to the bike rides and why I love them as I do. For just a week I get to pretend and imagine. I feel strangely connected to and inspired by these public symbol gracing their towns and the power of faith that must have been so alive and a part of those who lived to erect them. Their faith and love of God was something they wanted and needed to make visible and real—and share it with others. They wanted to mark themselves as Catholic and always be reminded of WHO they were—and receive the blessing of protection that came upon them in return. They were proud to be Christian and bold in their convictions and wanted everyone to know. It draws me back every year.

And Im always left with the same question: Is the “village” of my life marked with these visible and public expressions of the faith that I also confess and believe in? When people approach me or depart from an encounter with me—would they know that a love of Jesus Christ lives here?  High above all the stuff  and activity of my day to day life—is there something more important rising above it all; looking down? And most of all— What sits at the CENTER of my village from which everything else radiates outward?