St. Christopher Church, Cergy

The Saint-Christophe church is a Catholic parish church located in Cergy, France. Its extraordinary Renaissance portal facing the village and its Romanesque bell tower, which is one of the oldest in the department with two floors, are eye-catching. Passing through the portal, one enters a kind of open-air vestibule, which offers a view of architectural remains and masonry ruptures, and gives the image of a partially ruined church. This is not quite the case, as the work undertaken during the Renaissance was never completed, but the old Romanesque nave from the 1130s / 1140s was indeed demolished in 1904. It was dilapidated, and its removal facilitated the consolidation of the bell tower in 1905. The present western facade and the walls enclosing the Renaissance south aisle date from this period. From the inside, the church appears as a square space of three bays long and three bays wide, practically homogeneous except for the base of the bell tower which remains Romanesque. It has one of the oldest ribbed vaults preserved in the region, as well as six historiated capitals from the 1130s and 1140s, and an eastern arcade dating back to the second half of the 11th century. At that time, the Carolingian chapel with its flat chevet was enlarged by the addition of a semi-circular apse. This state as well as the plan of the second Romanesque church of the second quarter of the 12th century were revealed by excavations in 2002 / 2003. The rest of the church is Gothic and dates from the beginning of the 13th century. If the height under the vaults is low, the filling of the windows non-existent and the sculpture subject to clumsiness, the interior space seduces however by its large vaulted space at the same height, following the example of the choir-halls of the valley of the Oise and its surroundings. The church has been classified as a historical monument since 1913. It contains a large number of listed items of furniture, including funeral plaques and foundation plaques. Since the inauguration of two new parish churches in the new town of Cergy, the church of Saint-Christophe is no longer the center of parish life, but at least two masses a week are still celebrated there.