a community celebrating the 150th anniversary of the church – Swiss Catholic Portal

The community of the parish of Collombey (VS) was celebrating to celebrate the 150th anniversary of its church on October 6, 2024. Organ concert, speeches, festive mass and raclette brought together the faithful who came in large numbers.

“I am very happy because it is not only the walls, but an entire community that is celebrating,” confides Father Valentin Roduit, the young priest and vicar of the parish of Collombey. The children were present for the occasion, “they will be there for the 200 years of the church. This celebration unites the generations of our community, we can only rejoice.”

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The mass celebrated on the occasion of the 150th anniversary of the Collombey church has just ended. After the souvenir photo for which the concelebrating priests and the children of the heart posed on the square, everyone flocked to the aperitif. The cool temperature enveloping the atmosphere fails to numb the parishioners, who came in large numbers to celebrate their church.

A triple jubilee

A little earlier in the morning, the faithful were treated to a welcome coffee and croissant, an organ concert before the rather brief speeches of Father Jérôme Hauswirth, long-time parish priest of Collombey-Muraz, of the president of the Management Council and the President of the Parish Community Council. “150 years is a triple jubilee which represents approximately six generations. This may seem like a long time, said Father Hauswirth, but in the light of the history of Christianity in our region, more than 1,500 years since the martyrdom of Saint Maurice and his companions is not much.” The priest had a thought for all those who were baptized and married in this church. Without forgetting the first communions or the funerals of the flock spent in the parish.

A heritage maintained and safeguarded

Nadia Borsay praised, on behalf of the Community Council, the work of the parishioners who work to keep the place alive: sacristan, readers, altar servers, priests and religious. “What would our village be without this place of celebration and this caring community?” She did not fail to highlight the work of previous generations who knew how to maintain and safeguard this heritage, the “historic heart of Collombey”.
The point is illustrated by the President of the management council who explains the blocked streets in the center of the village. Work to connect the remote heating to the church and the old rectory has just started. The story continues.

Father Patrice Gasser presided over the celebration in a full church. In addition to Fathers Hauswirth and Roduit, he was surrounded by Father Jean-René Fracheboud and Father Dominique Theux. Present was Brother Amédée Emaulaz who was, for 26 years, chaplain of the Bernardine Sisters of the monastery of Collombey before leaving for Tamier (France), where he became a Trappist monk. The Collombey mixed choir gave voice, just as its members had sung during the inauguration of the church (see below) (cath.ch/bh)

12 years of work
Bastien Clerc, a young parishioner who is interested in heritage, presented a brief history of the church.
We are at the end of the 1850s. The old church, located north of the cemetery dating from 1616, is becoming dangerous. The prayers of the parishioners no longer go straight to the Lord, but get lost in the increasingly apparent cracks of the building. Some of the faithful advocate the restoration of the current church. They will quickly oppose those in favor of building a new church. This year 1860 will be very lively. Letters, petitions, assemblies will follow one another at a sustained pace.

First stone
So much so that the Department of the Interior of the canton of Valais got involved. He asks the Parish Council to decide. In its meeting of February 29, 1860, the Council sided with those who wanted total reconstruction and notified the department.
We know that on February 18, 1862, the Parish Council, for the commission responsible for the construction of the church, established a regulation which defined the responsibilities of the said commission. In that same year, the architect Emile Vuilloud was asked to supervise the work. The first stone was laid on June 9, 1962. The construction of the new church will last 12 years. Several loans will be necessary. The Sisters of the Bernardine monastery are donating 50 gold louis (approx. 1,159 francs) for the project.

Inauguration
The Valais Gazette relates the inauguration of the church on November 15, 1874: “It is therefore with good reason that October 24 and 25 (1874) were days of joy in Collombey; the inhabitants had put on their festive clothes, two triumphal arches were raised near the church which, like the tower, were adorned with banners in the pontifical and Valais colors; the militia was on foot, the mortars made the echoes of the hills resound; the entire parish having its R. Curé (Abbot Fabien Michellod) at its head and the honorable Council went to meet Mgr. the bishop of the diocese who arrived to consecrate the new church. Mgr de Preux was received under the first triumphal arch where feelings of respect and veneration, then gratulation and attachment were exchanged between the pastor and the flock. Mgr. was then taken to the presbytery. The next day after the long and beautiful ceremony of the consecration of the church, a musical mass, an excellent composition by Mr. Eter, student of the Munich conservatory and professor of singing at the college of St Maurice, was well sung by the maids. and pure voices of the Mixed Choir of Collombey, skillfully conducted by the teacher Parvex.”

The church was electrified in 1904 and in 1967 the new organ was installed. It was not until 1968 that the old church was demolished. It gave way to the new rectory which later became a simple family home. There were therefore two churches in Collombey for 94 years. Old Collombey-Muraz Association