The Église Saint-Georges (Church of St. George) is a

Roman Catholic Roman or Romans most often refers to: *Rome, the capital city of Italy * Ancient Rome, Roman civilization from 8th century BC to 5th century AD * Roman people, the people of ancient Rome *'' Epistle to the Romans'', shortened to ''Romans'', a let ...

church Church may refer to: Religion * Church (building), a building for Christian religious activities * Church (congregation), a local congregation of a Christian denomination * Church service, a formalized period of Christian communal worship * C ...

located on the Place François-Bertras, in the

Vieux Lyon The Vieux Lyon ( en, Old Lyon) is the largest Renaissance district of Lyon. In 1964, Vieux-Lyon, the city's oldest district, became the first site in France to be protected under the Malraux law to protect France's cultural sites. Covering an ar ...

quarter, in the

5th arrondissement of Lyon The 5th arrondissement of Lyon is one of the nine arrondissements of the City of Lyon. History The 5th arrondissement was created on 24 March 1852 (date of creation of the first five arrondissements). It is the historic center of Lyon. It is at ...

. It is under the direction of the Primatiale parish and was named in honor of

Saint George Saint George (Greek: Γεώργιος (Geórgios), Latin: Georgius, Arabic: القديس جرجس; died 23 April 303), also George of Lydda, was a Christian who is venerated as a saint in Christianity. According to tradition he was a soldie ...

. The cathedral is near the Place Benoît-Crépu, between the quarter of the and Saint-Jean quarters.

History

A church located on this place was built in 550, but was destroyed around 732 during a raid of the Saracens, but was restored in 802 by Leidrade. In the fourteenth century, it remained a parish church, but was used by the Sovereign Military Hospitaller Order of Saint John of Jerusalem, or

Order of Malta The Sovereign Military Order of Malta (SMOM), officially the Sovereign Military Hospitaller Order of Saint John of Jerusalem, of Rhodes and of Malta ( it, Sovrano Militare Ordine Ospedaliero di San Giovanni di Gerusalemme, di Rodi e di Malta; ...

, and in 1315, the Commandery was located just next and had several windows and two cylindrical towers overlooking the

Saône The Saône ( , ; frp, Sona; lat, Arar) is a river in eastern France. It is a right tributary of the Rhône, rising at Vioménil in the Vosges department and joining the Rhône in Lyon, at the southern end of the Presqu'île. The name ...

. Lange's family paid for the repairs of the church which were conducted by the commander Humbert de Beauvoir. In 1793, it became a hay barn and became a national property, in 1892, was restored by the architect Pollet. The current church was rebuilt in 1845 and completed in 1848, after plans by the architect

Pierre Bossan Pierre-Marie Bossan (23 July 1814, in Lyon – 23 July 1888, in La Ciotat) was a French historicist architect, a pupil of Henri Labrouste, specialising in ecclesiastical architecture. Life and work In 1844 he was appointed architect to the ...

who also made plans for the

basilica of Fourviere In Ancient Roman architecture, a basilica is a large public building with multiple functions, typically built alongside the town's forum. The basilica was in the Latin West equivalent to a stoa in the Greek East. The building gave its name ...

. Abandoned between the late 1970s and 1989, the church was later assigned by Cardinal

Albert Decourtray Albert Florent Augustin Decourtray S.T.D. (9 April 1923 – 16 September 1994) was a French Catholic Cardinal and Archbishop of Lyon. Biography Early life He was born in the hamlet of L'Amiteuse near Lille, France. He entered the minor seminar ...

to the Priestly Fraternity of St. Peter under the Motu proprio

Ecclesia Dei ''Ecclesia Dei'' is the document Pope John Paul II issued on 2 July 1988 in reaction to the Ecône consecrations, in which four priests of the Society of Saint Pius X were ordained as bishops despite an express prohibition by the Holy See. The ...

, which granted the practice of liturgical books of 1962 in Latin. The community was given by Cardinal

Philippe Barbarin Philippe Xavier Christian Ignace Marie Barbarin (born 17 October 1950) is a French Roman Catholic prelate who was the Archbishop of Lyon from 2002 to 2020. He was made a cardinal in 2003. He was charged in 2017 and convicted in 2019 of failin ...

to three priests from the Fraternity of St. Peter, who joined the diocese. On 25 August 2007, Cardinal Barbarin signed the incardination of three of the five priests who served the church. Also in 2007, after repairs to the exterior of the church and adjoining spaces, the inauguration took place in the presence of Cardinal Barbarin and Senator-Mayor of Lyon

Gérard Collomb Gérard Collomb (; born 20 June 1947) is a French politician who served as Mayor of Lyon from 2001 to 2017 and again from 2018 until 2020. A member of La République En Marche! (LREM) since he left the Socialist Party (PS) in 2017, he was Mini ...

Architecture

The church was rebuilt in

neogothic Gothic Revival (also referred to as Victorian Gothic, neo-Gothic, or Gothick) is an architectural movement that began in the late 1740s in England. The movement gained momentum and expanded in the first half of the 19th century, as increasingly ...

style. Architect Pierre Bossan, who also made the furniture, later deemed his work on this church as a "youthful mistake". The sculpture on the facade was made by Charles Dufraine and stained glasses are the artwork of Maréchal de Metz. The building is classified as monument historique. The tower has a height of 67 meters. A polychrome wooden altarpiece of the sixteenth century shows the coronation of the Virgin.

References

External links

*
Official site
{{DEFAULTSORT:Eglise Saint-Georges Roman Catholic churches in Lyon 19th-century Roman Catholic church buildings in France 5th arrondissement of Lyon Roman Catholic churches completed in 1848 Monuments historiques of Lyon Gothic Revival church buildings in France Churches used by the Priestly Fraternity of St. Peter