Welcoming the Stranger: The Sheltering of Jewish Refugees at Le Chambon-sur-Lignon

At the beginning of the Second World War, France had a population of forty-four million people with 800,000 Protestants (2% of the population) and 320,000 Jews (0.8% of the population). ⁽²⁸⁾ In 1940 the Vivarais-Lignon plateau had a population of 24,000, of whom 35% were Protestants, an exceptionally high proportion when considered against the national average. Le Chambon-sur-Lignon, one of twelve villages on the plateau, had a population of just over 2,500, 95% of whom were Protestant. Of these, the majority were members of the Reformed Church of France, along with approximately 1,000 Darbystes, ⁽²⁹⁾ and some Salvation Army and Quakers.

France surrendered to the Germans in June 1940 and First World War hero Marshall Philippe Pétain formed the Vichy government. ⁽³⁰⁾ Catholics and Protestants alike supported Pétain’s spiritual diagnosis of France’s problems and his slogan of “Family, Work, Fatherland.” Even the Grand Rabbi of France initially saw Pétain as someone to be trusted ⁽³¹⁾ and preaching on the plateau ⁽³²⁾ and the plateau’s Protestant journal—L’Echo de la Montagne ⁽³³⁾—were both initially supportive of Pétain’s program. However, as soon became clear, at the core of Pétain’s policies was collaboration with the Nazis as the undisputed leaders of a future Europe and implementation of Nazi policies as the supposed price of being part of the new Europe. ⁽³⁴⁾

Many Protestant leaders in France had been aware from the early 1930s through theologians such as Karl Barth of the deeply anti-Christian and pagan nature of Nazi totalitarianism and therefore the dangers of any French collaboration. ⁽³⁵⁾ At Le Chambon-sur-Lignon, the day after the armistice was signed with Germany, on June 23, 1940, the two lead pastors of the Reformed Church at Le Chambonsur-Lignon—André Trocmé and Édouard Theis—presented a statement to their parishioners pregnant with biblical allusions declaring that the “. . . power of this totalitarianism is like the authority of the Beast which is described in chapter 13 of the Apocalypse,” ⁽³⁶⁾ and calling on the community to “. . . oppose the violence inflicted against their conscience with the weapons of the [Holy] Spirit” and “. . . refuse to collaborate with this violence.” ⁽³⁷⁾ Within nine months of the signing of the armistice, the head of the French Reformed Church, Marc Boegner, was writing in March 1941 to the Vice President of Pétain’s advisory council and the Chief Rabbi in France expressing his distress at the antisemitic measures being introduced. ⁽³⁸⁾ A group of French Protestant theologians and pastors concerned at the direction of the Vichy government met at Pomeyrol in September 1941 and developed a series of biblical theses denouncing antisemitism, and these were distributed widely. ⁽³⁹⁾

One of André Trocmé’s first initiatives after the armistice (with the support of his Parish Council) was, in late 1940, to visit the refugee internment camps in Marseille. Here over 50,000 internees from many different countries, from children through to adult, were living in conditions of “awful filth and destitution.” ⁽⁴⁰⁾ Even though this was in the French-controlled zone, by the end of 1940 Gestapo inspectors were already working to deport political refugees and Jews to Germany. ⁽⁴¹⁾ Trocmé concluded an agreement with Protestant aid agencies—notably the Quakers, Swiss Aid to Children, and the Protestant refugee aid agency, Cimade ⁽⁴²⁾—that Le Chambon-sur-Lignon would be a place of refuge for any children and adults the agencies could get released. ⁽⁴³⁾ From 1941 the refugees were mostly children, ⁽⁴⁴⁾ the number of adults rapidly increasing from mid-1942 through both Protestant and Jewish rescue networks. ⁽⁴⁵⁾ Le Chambon-sur-Lignon had a long history of tourism, hospitality, and social endeavours such as children’s homes ⁽⁴⁶⁾ and so refugees were able to take advantage of the existing infrastructure which included six hotels with 225 rooms and thirty-eight pensions. ⁽⁴⁷⁾ Depopulation of rural areas on the wider plateau had helped make houses available for refugees. Farms also needed workers, ⁽⁴⁸⁾ giving further economic incentives for villagers to welcome refugees.

Civil resistance against the Vichy regime slowly increased at Le Chambon-sur-Lignon. In 1940 students at the new Protestant school—l’École nouvelle Cévenol, founded in 1938 on principles of internationalism, peace, and non-violence ⁽⁴⁹⁾—refused to salute the French flag as required by the Vichy government. ⁽⁵⁰⁾ When Marshall Pétain commanded that all church bells be rung on August 1, 1941, to celebrate the anniversary of the Legion of soldiers, this order was also disobeyed. ⁽⁵¹⁾ After the arrest of 12,000 Jews in the Rafle du Vel’d’Hiv ⁽⁵²⁾ in Paris in July 1942 resistance hardened across the whole of France and large-scale spiritual resistance truly started on the plateau. ⁽⁵³⁾ Within a month, school students read a statement about their opposition to the arrest of Jews to a visiting high-ranking Vichy official. ⁽⁵⁴⁾ As it became clear to the French authorities that refugees were being sheltered illegally (at least according to the Vichy laws), ⁽⁵⁵⁾ false papers were forged at volume, including identity cards, cards to enable access to rationed food and household goods, and even false French army demobilisation cards. Approximately 5,000 sets of papers had been produced for Jews and non-Jews by the end of the war. ⁽⁵⁶⁾ Discussion about how to respond to events was held weekly at lay-led neighbourhood Bible study groups over open Bibles and with prayer. ⁽⁵⁷⁾ A further meeting at Pomeyrol attended by forty-six pastors was held in September 1942 to reflect on responses to the Jewish question. ⁽⁵⁸⁾

On November 11, 1942, after the allies had invaded North Africa, the Germans occupied the southern zone of France, ⁽⁵⁹⁾ bringing overt Jewish persecution from January 1943. ⁽⁶⁰⁾ In February 1943 the Vichy government established the Compulsory Work Service ⁽⁶¹⁾ which required more than 600,000 Frenchmen to work in Germany in terrible conditions. ⁽⁶²⁾ This led many young men to flee and join the armed resistance, raising the presence of armed Maquis ⁽⁶³⁾ on the plateau and increasing the level of violent resistance. ⁽⁶⁴⁾ Teachers and students—including theological students—were also joining the Maquis and engaging in armed resistance, much to the disappointment of Trocmé and Theis, who saw non-violence as central to their Christian faith. ⁽⁶⁵⁾ One student readying himself for future theological studies said, “I know that the Gospel is against violence, but France must be liberated.” ⁽⁶⁶⁾

The police imprisoned Andre Trocmé, Édouard Theis, and the head of the local schools—Roger Darcissac—from February 13 to March 15, 1943, because of their activities in sheltering Jewish refugees. The pastors subsequently went into hiding in August after receiving tip-offs to avoid arrest by the Gestapo. ⁽⁶⁷⁾ However, this was not before eighteen students and their teacher, Daniel Trocmé (a cousin of André’s), were arrested and sent to concentration camps where they all subsequently died. ⁽⁶⁸⁾ André Trocmé returned to Le Chambon in June 1944, and while he “. . . knew that his congregation had not become hard-core pacifist,” ⁽⁶⁹⁾ the work of sheltering Jewish refugees had continued in his absence.

Paris and most of France were liberated from August 1944. ⁽⁷⁰⁾ By the close of the hostilities with Germany, the plateau had sheltered 2,000 to 3,500 Jews and another 1,500 non-Jewish refugees. ⁽⁷¹⁾ This included twenty-five different nationalities with an average age of thirty-five, 27% of the refugees being younger than sixteen. ⁽⁷²⁾ This had required cooperation from pastors, parishioners, civil servants, town halls, and even the French Prefecture and police through less than diligent enforcement. ⁽⁷³⁾ The conditions were not idyllic, the community often functioning like a real-life family with all its “. . . moods, passions, different interests, kindnesses, malice . . .” ⁽⁷⁴⁾ However, despite this, Patrick Henry observed that “No other effort on this scale occurred for this length of time anywhere else in Occupied Europe.” ⁽⁷⁵⁾

After the Second World War, France sought to forget and even deny its collaboration with Nazi Germany. ⁽⁷⁶⁾ France needed heroes, and those immediately to hand were military leaders such as Charles de Gaule and members of the armed resistance. Non-violent rescue of Jewish refugees was not considered heroic. As most non-violent rescuers in France saw their actions as deeply private, they said little or nothing, and recognition was not forthcoming. ⁽⁷⁷⁾

While there had been an article in Peace News in 1953, ⁽⁷⁸⁾ and André Trocmé had been declared “Righteous Among the Nations” in 1971 (along with Mireille Philip and Daniel Trocmé in 1976), ⁽⁷⁹⁾ the “legend” of Le Chambon-sur-Lignon only started in 1979 with the publication of Philip Hallie’s book, Lest Innocent Blood Be Shed. ⁽⁸⁰⁾ This book was followed by Pierre Sauvage’s 1986 film, Weapons of the Spirit. ⁽⁸¹⁾ Hallie and Sauvage’s work stirred up issues that continue to be debated including the importance (or not) of Protestantism in the rescue (a central theme of this paper), the role of pacifism versus armed resistance, the contribution of economics, the role of Pastor André Trocmé versus that of others, and the place of Le Chambon-sur-Lignon in sheltering Jewish refugees versus that of the other villages on the plateau. ⁽⁸²⁾ Rebalancing of perspectives occurred at a major historical colloquium held on the plateau in 1990, ⁽⁸³⁾ with a smaller second colloquium held in 2002. ⁽⁸⁴⁾ These gatherings were followed in 2013 by a collection of papers designed to provide updated perspectives to coincide with the opening of a museum in Le Chambon-sur-Lignon. ⁽⁸⁵⁾ In parallel with these major activities, interest in the events in Le Chambon-sur-Lignon and the Vivarais-Lignon Plateau has continued unabated through many academic and non-academic publications. While their papers address different issues to this one, Patrick Henry’s 2015 literature survey ⁽⁸⁶⁾ and Nathalie Heinich’s 2023 article ⁽⁸⁷⁾ together provide a useful review of what has been published. ⁽⁸⁸⁾

Social imaginary statement 1: We are Huguenot ⁽¹⁰²⁾ Protestants, a community different from the rest of France, with a long history of persecution by the majority people and the state.

“A singular group of people with a singular history: this Huguenot stock, this memory of their persecution—not only the fact that they had a history of persecution but that they remembered it, that it mattered to them.” ⁽¹⁰³⁾

The reasons for the rescue of Jewish refugees at Le Chambon-sur-Lignon centre on the community’s strong Reformed Protestant identity. Cabanel’s 2011 analysis of the numbers of the “Righteous Among the Nations” in France—Les Justes—indicated that 10.7% of Justes were Protestant, even though they were only 2% of the population. ⁽¹⁰⁴⁾ This analysis also noted that in France 0.12% of Catholic priests and yet 6–7% of Protestant pastors were Justes. ⁽¹⁰⁵⁾ It is important not to overreach the data, but it appears that there are fundamental factors in French Reformed Protestantism in the 1940s that made them more likely—especially if they were pastors—to be engaged in sheltering Jewish refugees.

Marianne Ruel Robins is more cautious about the centrality of Protestantism; she prefers to see reasons for rescue as a web of factors and directly challenges any idea of Protestant exceptionalism or moral triumphalism. However, she notes the importance of their experiences as a religious minority and the religious culture that made Protestants more inclined to resist the civil authorities. ⁽¹⁰⁶⁾ Emmanuel Deun, on the other hand, describes an active cultivation of a spiritual Protestantism with those on the plateau being “. . . immunized by the spiritual heritage cultivated by Trocmé, Theis, and various others” ⁽¹⁰⁷⁾ against the deadening “emotional contagion” of Pétainism that had spread across France.

The Reformed Protestant Church in France began with eighty years of conflict and persecution until the Edict of Nantes in 1598 introduced a measure of freedom within circumscribed limits. The edict’s revocation in 1685 led to intense persecution in the time known as le Désert until the rights of Protestants to worship freely was restored in 1787 under the Edict of Tolerance. ⁽¹⁰⁸⁾ Protestants had been on the plateau since the 1560s, ⁽¹⁰⁹⁾ benefitting in the face of persecution from the shelter and cohesion its geographical isolation brought. ⁽¹¹⁰⁾ This history of persecution had contributed to a religious culture that made Protestants more inclined to resist civil authorities. ⁽¹¹¹⁾ Across the plateau Protestants demonstrated strong social solidarity, a concern for public morality, and a desire for education. ⁽¹¹²⁾ Baron Haussmann noted in 1832 the strong memory of persecution of the Protestants in Haute-Loire. ⁽¹¹³⁾ Magda Trocmé summarised the effect of this memory in this way: “So, in a way, we were prepared [to shelter Jewish refugees]. And the village was prepared because of its Huguenot past.” ⁽¹¹⁴⁾

Symbols and practices that both reflected and reinforced history were intermingled in the village. For example, street names commemorated events—the road called the chemin du Dragon remembered oppression by Louis XIV’s soldiers, ⁽¹¹⁵⁾ scout troops were named after pastor martyrs of the time of intense persecution known as le Désert, ⁽¹¹⁶⁾ popular songs recounted history, ⁽¹¹⁷⁾ Protestant cemeteries and churches were constructed to contrast with the Catholic equivalents, ⁽¹¹⁸⁾ Protestant crosses were different from Catholic crosses, and there were plaques showing where there had been places of past Protestant worship. ⁽¹¹⁹⁾ Anny Latour, a Jew sheltered on the plateau, noted that the community made pilgrimages to a place of past persecution, ⁽¹²⁰⁾ and it was common for Huguenots to visit caves where their ancestors had hidden. ⁽¹²¹⁾

The Tower of Constance, used in the seventeenth century to imprison Huguenots who refused to recant their faith was an enduring symbol of resistance. The director of the schools in Le Chambon, Roger Darcissac, had postcards printed with a picture of the tower and the text: “Many Protestants—men and women—were imprisoned there [the Tower] after the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes (1685) [when the rights of Protestants to worship were removed], until 1768. One of them, perhaps Marie Durand who was a prisoner for thirty-eight years, inscribed on a rock this word: Resist.” ⁽¹²²⁾ These postcards were used to communicate the arrivals of Jews across the plateau ⁽¹²³⁾ and the clandestine tract Resistance also took its name from these events. ⁽¹²⁴⁾ All these images, symbols, stories, and exemplars provided reminders of Huguenot history and as the background to the imagination of those living in and around the village they were harnessed to support rescue.

Social imaginary statement 2: We are a people of the Book—our people came into being through the Bible, we see our story of persecution in the Bible though parallels with Israel, every house has a Bible, we read it, hear it read, name our children after it, and seek to live by it.

“. . . we are in a place of the Bible.” ⁽¹²⁵⁾

The centrality of the Bible on the plateau is well attested. Boulet notes the prominence of the Bible, highlighting its promises of freedom and hope “in times of trouble and affliction,” ⁽¹²⁶⁾ as well as the sense of history it gave where reading the Bible in secret was a sign of resistance. ⁽¹²⁷⁾ Batten maintains that André Trocmé’s use of the Bible was a significant factor in how he catalysed spiritual resistance, building on the average Protestant’s devotion to the Bible through preaching and the neighbourhood Bible studies. ⁽¹²⁸⁾ One of the rescuers, Georgette Barraud, said, “The welcome here had a lot to do with people still believing in something. In the Bible, it is written to feed the hungry. To visit the sick. That is a normal thing to do.” ⁽¹²⁹⁾

While many rescuers when interviewed did not give explicitly theological reasons for their actions, the thought world of the Bible was never far away. Marianne Ruel Robins warns about giving theological reasons too much weight, arguing that “. . . theology is not the exclusive domain of an elite, which would be faithfully transmitted to consenting ears, but what is appropriated, rejected, interpreted and transformed by the faithful who are not professional theologians.” ⁽¹³⁰⁾ But because a paysan who rescues Jews cannot give a carefully structured theological reason to an interviewer for their actions, this does not mean that their habitus has not been deeply theological formed. Boismorand states: “80% [of the Plateau Protestants] were unsure of their political stance, but all had acknowledged that a human being, Jewish or Christian, friend or enemy, persecuted or decorated, had the right to refuge, protection, and sustenance in the Church of Jesus Christ, and therefore in the Cévenol school and under the roof of those who had found the guidance for their daily life in the Bible.” ⁽¹³¹⁾

The Bible was an ever-present symbol at Le Chambon-sur-Lignon. There was a Bible in every house, Bibles were given to couples at their marriage, biblical names were commonly given to children, ⁽¹³²⁾ there was always a Bible open in the pulpit of the Temple, ⁽¹³³⁾ going to the Sunday service was called going au prêche, to the preaching (of the Bible), ⁽¹³⁴⁾ and long winters with little activity meant that social relations between neighbours were often dominated by reading the Bible. ⁽¹³⁵⁾ There was a Protestant newspaper—L’Echo de la Montagne—with a readership of around 2,500. Edited by two pastors and two lay people, it regularly included articles citing the Bible and biblical reasons for action. ⁽¹³⁶⁾

The internalisation of the content of the Bible into the social imaginary of the people was reinforced by many practices. There were regular services at the Temple where the Bible was preached and psalms sung, Sunday school, a three-year catechism process leading to confirmation, and young people’s groups. ⁽¹³⁷⁾ André Trocmé’s predecessor, Roger Casalis, noted that Sunday afternoon meetings had been an excellent opportunity for discussion over the Bible, and that most of the participants had been women. ⁽¹³⁸⁾ Trocmé’s preaching covered the biblical themes of “. . . hospitality, love of God and love of neighbour, non-conformity, welcoming the stranger, and the Jews as God’s chosen people with whom the Protestants had much in common . . .” ⁽¹³⁹⁾ The regular singing of psalms and canticles continually placed the Huguenots of the plateau in the thought world of the Jewish people facing hardship.

André Trocmé saw the neighbour Bible studies as especially important. He notes that at their meetings prayers were “. . . fervent, practical, concrete. It was there—not elsewhere—that we received from God answers to very complex problems that we needed to resolve to house and hide Jews in the months that followed.” ⁽¹⁴⁰⁾ Both the Bible as a symbol and its actual content were used to support the daily work of the sheltering of Jewish refugees. Because of the place of the Bible in the social imaginary of the Huguenots and their familiarity with it, an appeal to the Bible as the basis for rescuing Jewish refugees would be responded to positively.

Social imaginary statement 3: The Jews are our cousins in the faith, we share with them the Old Testament, and they share with us a long history of persecution in France, and are often grouped with us when we and they are attacked.

“. . . they were the people of God. That is what mattered.” ⁽¹⁴¹⁾

The most widely cited religious reason for rescuers across Europe acting as they did appears to be an affinity with the Jewish people. ⁽¹⁴²⁾ Gushee sees this sense of kinship with the Jewish people as an important driver for the sheltering of Jewish refugees by Protestants in France, Denmark, and the Netherlands. ⁽¹⁴³⁾ While some influential French Protestants were antisemitic, ⁽¹⁴⁴⁾ in general Huguenots felt a special affinity with the Jews in France for both theological and historical reasons. Cabanel notes the commonality of the Old Testament in their belief systems as well as the shared ties of centuries of persecution. ⁽¹⁴⁵⁾ Theologically, Calvin was less hostile to Jews than Luther, seeing the connection between the two Testaments in terms of continuity rather than rupture. ⁽¹⁴⁶⁾ French Reformed Protestant thinking (at least among the elites) about the Jewish people was reflected in Les Thèses de Pomeyrol developed by theologians and pastors in September 1941 which rejected antisemitism on biblical grounds. ⁽¹⁴⁷⁾

Antisemitism and anti-Protestantism were historically twin hatreds in France, with both groups seen as marginal to wider society. ⁽¹⁴⁸⁾ Conspiracy theories were common ⁽¹⁴⁹⁾ and Catholics often combined Jews, Protestants, and Muslims in their attacks—these threats were not idle as the white terrors of 1795 and 1815 had shown in le Midi. It appears that most Huguenots, while perhaps not reflecting on the text of the Bible in any deep theological manner, identified with the Jews of the Old Testament when meeting violence. ⁽¹⁵⁰⁾ The Huguenot people had been Dreyfusards during the time of the trial for espionage of the Jewish army officer Alfred Dreyfus. ⁽¹⁵¹⁾ The leader of the Reformed Church, Marc Boegner, was already writing to the Chief Rabbi in March 1941 expressing the pain the National Council felt regarding the recent antisemitic legislation. ⁽¹⁵²⁾ Protestant leaders compared the rafles from 1942 when Jews were rounded up for deportation ⁽¹⁵³⁾ with the St. Bartholomew’s day massacre of Protestants in 1572. ⁽¹⁵⁴⁾ In September 1942 there was a gathering at the Protestant museum, Le Musée du Désert, where 4,000 people attended, including some Jews. ⁽¹⁵⁵⁾ Thus, attacks on the Jewish people often found an echo in the Huguenot experience and imagination.

This theologically and historically derived affinity was maintained through several practices. The plateau newspaper L’Echo de la Montagne used Bible citations to argue for affinity with Jews in 1943, ⁽¹⁵⁶⁾ André Trocmé preached the affinities with the Jewish people regularly, and the content discussed in the neighbourhood Bible studies regularly reinforced connections with the Jewish people. Parents gave their children Hebrew names and there was level of community solidarity—for example between the Protestant and Jewish scouting movements. ⁽¹⁵⁷⁾ All these practices reinforced the social imaginary of a people having deep affinity with the Jewish people and therefore preparing them to shelter Jewish refugees.

Social imaginary statement 4: We are a people of hospitality who habitually welcome the stranger and the one fleeing persecution.

“The hand of compassion is much quicker than the calculation of reason!” ⁽¹⁵⁸⁾

People do not become hospitable to strangers overnight. As the Oliners noted, “Their [rescuers’] involvements with Jews grew out of the ways in which they ordinarily related to other people . . .” ⁽¹⁵⁹⁾ This was the same at Le Chambon-sur-Lignon—they did not become what they had not been but were heirs to a long history of hospitality to the needy. Hospitality was already part of their social imaginary. There were established traditions of giving to the poor, providing respite and health care for children, and welcoming refugees. ⁽¹⁶⁰⁾ Batten notes that while the villagers were taciturn by nature, they had historically sheltered those in need and cites the example from 1790 of sheltering Roman Catholic priests refusing to take the oath to the new state. ⁽¹⁶¹⁾ Respite children’s homes were established from the late nineteenth century, ⁽¹⁶²⁾ with one such work having six hundred families across the plateau involved by the early twentieth century in welcoming these children. ⁽¹⁶³⁾ These were the foundations of the social imaginary supporting work with refugees in the 1940s.

The role of economic factors in the provision of hospitality continues to create disagreement among researchers. While acknowledging “la dimension morale” of the rescue, Serge Bernard maintains the primacy of economic reasons for the tradition of welcome on the plateau. ⁽¹⁶⁴⁾ In response to this, Patrick Henry criticises Bernard for confusing ends and means, writing: “But it is the spirituality, the moral courage, and the high degree of human solidarity of the inhabitants of the region [rather than economic aspects] which explain what happened between 1939 and 1944.” ⁽¹⁶⁵⁾ Likewise, the Oliners and Eva Fogleman in their studies of rescuers across Europe maintain the primacy of the character of the rescuer. While economic interests and infrastructure were clearly a factor in enabling the shelter of refugees, at the core there was a community decision to provide shelter to those who needed it because of a deeply formed social imaginary that saw the importance of providing hospitality to the marginalised. It seems best to conclude that economic reasons should be considered as supporting factors that helped with the provision of hospitality rather than primary aspects of the social imaginary that drove rescuers to be hospitable.

Hospitality was reinforced from the biblical teaching in sermons and the various discussion groups. One pastor on the plateau, André Bettex, described the common sources of the imperative to shelter refugees as: “Our biblical formation. The duty of hospitality in Isaiah 58:7: ‘Share your bread with the hungry, and bring the wretched homeless into your house.’” ⁽¹⁶⁶⁾ The Huguenot history encouraged compassion for others in need, just as their own ancestors had been persecuted and become refugees. At Le Chambon-sur-Lignon, the example of Magda Trocmé and her almost frenetic commitment to hospitality to whoever had need would also have influenced many. ⁽¹⁶⁷⁾ As the four social imaginary statements are considered, a social imaginary of Huguenot identity and the importance of the Bible worked together to reinforce habits of hospitality to a people to whom they had a historically close affinity.

While the social imaginary of the parishioners was foundational to the rescue, the pastors and their wives as leaders played a special role in catalysing this rescue by encouraging their parishioners to act on their social imaginaries. The additional aspects of their social imaginary that supported the rescue are discussed below.

Social imaginary statement 5: As pastors, we are part of an international movement and these connections have helped convince us that the growing totalitarianism in the world is pagan and anti-Christian.

“Formidable pagan pressures are going to exercise themselves on us and on our families to try and lead us to passive submission to totalitarian ideology.” ⁽¹⁶⁸⁾

International awareness of what was occurring in Europe, both politically and theologically, among pastors and elites in French Protestantism is well supported. ⁽¹⁶⁹⁾ The Protestant aid agencies had strong internationalist roots ⁽¹⁷⁰⁾ and in Le Chambon-sur-Lignon the recently started Protestant school, l’École nouvelle Cévenol, had a self-conscious internationalist nature ⁽¹⁷¹⁾ reflecting the internationalist perspectives of the pastors Trocmé and Theis. Strong national and international connections enabled pastors and other leaders to understand the implications of what was happening in Europe in the 1930s and therefore what was likely to occur in Vichy France.

National Socialism’s structural inequality, its dismissal of the vulnerable, and its antisemitism were all reasons to see it as deeply anti-Christian. ⁽¹⁷²⁾ Karl Barth provided a theological model for how to understand the rise of Naziism, ⁽¹⁷³⁾ attacking it as a false religion. ⁽¹⁷⁴⁾ The Barmen Declaration of 1934 by the Confessing Church with which Barth had been involved was seen by French Protestant leaders as a significant document in increasingly difficult times. ⁽¹⁷⁵⁾ In 1937, several pastors from the Vivarais-Lignon Plateau—including André Trocmé—attended a conference at Saint-Jean-Chambre on the plateau centred around the theology of Karl Barth, with Barth himself present. ⁽¹⁷⁶⁾

The pastors in Le Chambon understood the nature of the rising totalitarianism in the world. André and Magda Trocmé were both, “Lucid observers of the international situation.” ⁽¹⁷⁷⁾ André’s mother had been German and so he kept a close eye on events in Germany while Magda was Italian and did the same with Italy. André Trocmé’s first personal contact with Naziism was on the “March for Peace” across Europe in 1932 when in Heidelberg his group was confronted by Nazi Brownshirts, one of whom brandished a revolver at André. He observed that the growing brutality of Naziism let the Nazis act with impunity. ⁽¹⁷⁸⁾ The example of the Confessing Church in Germany from the Barmen Declaration in 1934 onwards was personally significant. “It was the example of those men, profoundly rooted in the Gospel, that we wished to inspire us.” ⁽¹⁷⁹⁾ Immediately after the French armistice with Germany, Trocmé and Theis presented their “Weapons of the Spirit” sermon ⁽¹⁸⁰⁾ likening totalitarianism to the authority of the Beast in the Apocalypse. The social imaginary of the pastors had been strongly shaped by what they had seen occurring in Europe. Out of a social imaginary that saw totalitarianism as pagan and anti-Christian they appealed to their parishioners through their history, the Bible, their affinity for the Jewish people, and their longstanding commitments to hospitality to shelter Jewish refugees.

Social imaginary statement 6: As pastors, we believe that the Christian response to the rising evils of totalitarianism must be one of active non-violent resistance using the weapons of the Spirit.

“Non-violence is not a theory superimposed on reality, it’s a journey that we explore day after day in communal prayer and obedience to the directions of the [Holy] Spirit.” ⁽¹⁸¹⁾

Examining this aspect of the social imaginary requires stepping into one of the Vivarais-Lignon plateau controversies. Philip Hallie, the writer who began the “legend” of Le Chambon-sur-Lignon, was a moral philosopher who sought to understand how non-violence worked in the context of rescuing Jewish refugees in France, and so his book reflected his own belief in the centrality of non-violence. ⁽¹⁸²⁾ While a non-violent approach was not universally adopted by the inhabitants of Le Chambon-sur-Lignon (and the wider plateau), it was however core to the Christian beliefs and daily lives of André Trocmé and Édouard Theis and deeply influenced their approach to leadership.

André Trocmé’s first encounter with Christian pacifism was as a teen in occupied France when he met a Christian German signals soldier. While this soldier was obliged to carry a weapon, he refused to fire it. ⁽¹⁸³⁾ When André undertook his military service, he told his commanding office he would not fire his weapon to kill anyone. ⁽¹⁸⁴⁾ Later, his pacifism made it difficult for him to find pastoral posts in France as the Evangelical Reformed Church had declared conscientious objection as irreconcilable with pastoral duties. ⁽¹⁸⁵⁾ Trocmé describes his position on nonviolence in Jesus and the Non-Violent Revolution. “His [Jesus’] nonviolence was not a means to reach this end, but rather a matter of obedience and witness to God, who is love and who alone will establish his kingdom on earth.” ⁽¹⁸⁶⁾ Trocmé’s non-violence was therefore deeply Christian in that it was focused on obedience to the commands of Jesus rather than a means to achieve an outcome.

While non-violent civil disobedience because of conscience was the position of most pastors across the plateau, violent and non-violent resistance coexisted, ⁽¹⁸⁷⁾ with the violent resistance of the Camisards across the Cévennes in the eighteenth century being part of the Huguenot memory of resistance. ⁽¹⁸⁸⁾ André Trocmé was deeply disappointed that at the end of the war, people desired violent retribution and disapproved of him preaching to German prisoners. ⁽¹⁸⁹⁾ However, while non-violence may not have been adopted by all the village, the non-violent beliefs and approach of the pastors provided a means of fighting back against totalitarianism through the rescue and shelter of Jewish refugees.

This non-violent resistance was anything but passive as is demonstrated by the lives of the Trocmés and the Theis. As a teen during the First World War, André Trocmé had lived in occupied France and was then a refugee in Belgium and so understood the consequences of war for displaced people. ⁽¹⁹⁰⁾ He was continually creative and active, thinking of new ways to communicate l’Évangile and see it lived out. “[H]e wrote Bible stories and Catechism lessons for children . . . He organized trips and outings, formed a men’s circle, started a choir, and even established a little folk museum. . .” ⁽¹⁹¹⁾ The opening of the Protestant school, L’École nouvelle Cévenol, with its explicit non-violent basis was one result from his enthusiasm (and Magda’s ideas). ⁽¹⁹²⁾ And it was of course his visit to the internment camps in Marseille in 1940–41 that helped start the flow of refugees to Le Chambon. All this had occurred through his wrestling with how to live out non-violence during a war. It is difficult to see how the community’s response to Jewish refugees could have occurred outside of the non-violent aspects of the social imaginaries of the leading pastors in Le Chambon-sur-Lignon and across the plateau.