The town of Bourbon-Lancy (Bourgogne-Franche-Comté) acquired in 2017 a building built in 1880 welcoming an old Catholic school. The town hall planned to renovate it in order to set up a social and cultural animation center. To finance the work, estimated at two million euros, it has requested several partners, including the Family Allowance Fund (CAF).
But CAF has subordinate the granting of a subsidy of 400,000 euros to the withdrawal of a statue representing King Saint Louis, as well as a cross located at the top of the building. According to the organization, this representation of the Capetian king, canonized in 1297, threatened the secularism required in public space.
The old school of Bourbon-Lancy: the statue of Saint Louis and the cross are visible above the front door of the building.
© Google Street View
In 2023, the town hall then agreed to move the statue in the gardens of the parish house. “It is indeed an agreement between the parish and the town hall so that Catholics can recover the statue and the cross” explained Anne Jacquemot, spokesperson for the bishop, at theAleteia.
But this decision aroused the indignation of several personalities, including Catherine Chaix, lawyer, Dimitri Casali, historian, and Pierre Valentin, essayist. In a platform published in Le Figaro, they denounced a “Treshing of law and an abyss of ignorance surrounding the definition of secularism”while deploring “The contempt that it is sometimes fashionable to display with regard to our history”. They believed that this affair made a threat over thousands of popular arts of art embodying the identity of French municipalities. Following these reactions, the association La France in division, engaged in the defense of the national cultural heritage and represented by Henri de Beauregard, began legal action.
In a decision rendered on April 22, 2025, the Dijon court judged that the condition of the CAF was illegal and that the statue of Saint Louis did not affect secularism. The judgment specifies that: “The statue in dispute, which represents Louis IX, also known as Saint Louis, crowned and coated with a coat decorated with Lys flowers, does not present the character of a sign or a religious emblem within the meaning of the law of December 9, 1905, even though it represents the king of France carrying in his left hand, on a cushion, the crown of thorns, in the way of a royal crown during a coronal crown”.
This decision could allow a resettlement of Saint Louis on the facade of the building.
