百年古教堂的前世今生

Article | Hu Ting Pictures | You Yu

一次采访路上，经过位于璧山区的正兴场镇，汽车开过金堂湖畔，突然间，一座哥特式教堂出现在眼前。白色的墙体，在松柏掩映下，安静肃穆。

我们不由得停下车，走进去一探究竟，意外地触摸与聆听了这座西南地区最大天主教古教堂的前世与今生。

On our way to an interview, we drove past the Jintang Lake in Zhengxing town, Bishan district,when suddenly a Gothic church appeared in front of us, with its white walls in the shadow of pine and cypress trees, quiet and solemn.

We cannot help stopping and walking into the church, only to learn the past and present of the largest ancient Catholic church in the southwest.

传教至此竟是为了它 The Secret of Building a Church Here

教堂名为露德堂，总面积17466平方米，由主教楼、钟楼、神父楼、修道院等组成，整体为石制结构，主要取自当地的石材。墙体基调为白色，蓝绿色作点缀。

神父兰连生带领我们进入了这座百年古教堂。

据《圣教入川记》记载，清嘉庆年间(1796年)，天主教传入璧山。到了清光绪五年左右，巴黎外方传教会传教士Franois Fleury来到璧山各乡镇传教布道，建设堂口。1898年，与璧山毗邻的大足爆发了以余栋臣为首的反洋教武装起义，波及附近州县，教堂悉数被毁，璧山正兴的教堂也未能幸免。

余栋臣领导的起义失败后，Franois Fleury返回正兴，利用清政府庚子赔款，在福登桥坎（现金堂湖旁)重新修建了一座教堂。

Franois Fleury为何会在地处偏僻的正兴修建教堂呢？

为了解开我们的疑惑，兰神父领着我们走进露德堂的大门。大门内的院子现在是停车场，兰神父指了指停车场里两个封了口的水井，“据说，刚修教堂时，Franois Fleury在露德堂内疯狂地挖了48口井，后来都被填了。”

原来，当时的传教士除了传教，还有一个重要目的，就是矿藏。他们听说，教堂周围的地底下蕴藏着丰厚的油气资源。他们是否真挖了48口井，不得而知。不过中华人民共和国成立后，地质部门的确在正兴及周边地区发现了非常丰富的天然气资源，璧山由此成了重庆最早用上天然气的地方之一。

This church--Ludetang, an area of 17,466 square meters, consisting of the main church,the clock tower, the priests’ building and the monastery, was constructed mainly of the local stones. The fundamental color of the wall is white,with the embellishment of blue and green.

Father Lan Liansheng led us into this centuryold church.

According to The Records of the Introduction of the Catholicism into Sichuan, during the period of Jiaqing in Qing Dynasty (1796), Catholicism was introduced into Bishan. In the 5th year of Emperor Guangxu’s reign of Qing Dynasty, the Paris missionary Franois Fleury came to preach in townships and villages of Bishan, and built the church. In 1898, Dazu, adjacent to Bishan, broke out an armed anti-foreign uprising led by Yu Dongchen,which spread to nearby counties. As a consequence,all churches were destroyed, and the church in Bishan was not spared.

After the defeat of the uprising led by Yu Dongchen, Franois Fleury returned to Zhengxing,using the Qing government’s Boxer indemnity to rebuild a church at Fudeng Bridge (near the Jintang Lake).

Why did Franois Fleury build a church in such a remote place as Zhengxing?

In order to answer our question, Father Lan led us into Ludetang. The courtyard inside the gate was now a parking lot, and Father Lan pointed to two sealed wells in the parking lot and said, “it is said that Franois Fleury dug 48 wells madly in Ludetang when the church was just built , all of which were later filled. “

It turned out that in addition to missionary missions, the missionaries at that time had another important purpose, that was, mineral resources.They heard that the underground surrounding the church was rich in oil and gas. It was unclear whether they actually dug 48 wells. But after the founding of the People’s Republic of China, the geological department did find very rich natural gas resources in and around Zhengxing, making Bishan one of the earliest places in Chongqing to use natural gas.

藏有巧思的中西混搭 A Clever Mix of Chinese and Western Style

穿过停车场，堂区大门立现，大门采用中国传统的“八”字门，墙面上用的是类似中国传统建筑构件的斜撑式装饰构件，大门上方正中写着“天主堂”，两侧写着“圣堂维新光荣真主，钟声远震唤醒迷途”，横批“信望爱德”。

门后，小叶榕掩映着的玫瑰园，成了主教堂前的屏障。

主教堂造型雅致，立面采用了中国传统的牌坊，白色为主，上边犹如燕子的翅膀，分三个阶梯呈下，下部是五个拱形门洞，中部是装饰，顶上和两个院门一致，架着拉丁式十字架，青瓦檐下是中国装饰檐翘。中间有露德堂三个大字和一个圆形符号，左右两边是装饰的西式拱形假窗。再下面，是高高的石柱拱成的大门，尤为厚重。

露德堂的西方建筑特色与中式元素完美结合，成为中西建筑文化交融的典范，建筑工艺也令人咋舌。

从正拱形门进入主教堂内部，映入眼帘的是一个600多平方米的大厅，大厅里摆放着十多排木椅，左右各立着五根简洁的石柱，柱顶雕有精美的藤蔓图案，每根立柱之间悬挂着水晶吊灯。顶上是十多米高的浅蓝色半圆状穹顶，两排柱子与墙壁之间是较小的穹顶，形成了券柱式的构图。

“弧形穹顶的设计有聚集声音的效果，在教堂的最后面也能听到我的声音。 ”兰神父快步走到主教堂对面，让我们听他的声音是否有变化。

“你们再看里面这十根石柱有没有影子？”兰神父指着石柱和座椅的投影，让我们观察。果然，灯光照射下，地上也没有柱子的影子。原因是这里暗含着独特的采光设计。

Through the parking lot, the gate stood out. The Gate was a traditional Chinese gate which looked like the character “eight” in China. On the wall, it used an oblique braced decorative component similar to the traditional Chinese architectural component.On the front of the gate was written “the Catholic Church”, and on both sides was written “the Holy church is reformed and the God is glorious , and the sound of the bell awakens the lost “, and the horizontal streamer was “Faith, hope and love are virtues.”

Behind the gate, the rose garden, shaded by Chinese Banyan, became a barrier in front of the main church.

The main church was elegantly shaped with a white-dominated traditional Chinese memorial archway, the upper part of which looked like a swallow’s wings, and was divided into three downward steps, while there were five arch holes in the lower part and in the middle were a few decorations. The top of the archway was the same as the two gates of yard, decorated with Latin crosses.Under the bronze tile eaves were Chinese decorative cornice. In the middle of the eaves were three large characters and a round symbol, and the left and right sides of it were decorative western-style arched windows. And below, the door, which was supported by high column, was particularly full of history.

The western architectural features of Ludetang were perfectly combined with the Chinese elements and became a model for the integration of architectural culture between China and the West, and the construction technology was also astounding.

When you enter the main church through the arch front door, you can immediately see a hall of more than 600 square meters with more than a dozen rows of wooden chairs being placed. Around the wooden chairs, there stood five simple stone columns, whose top was engraved with exquisite vines figures, and crystal chandeliers were hanging between each of the columns.

“The arc-shaped Dome has the effect of gathering sound, and my voice can be heard at the end of the church, “ said Father Lan, who strode across the main church to see if his voice had faded.

“Do you see any shadows of these ten columns?“ Father Lan asked us to observe, pointing to the columns and the chairs. Sure enough, as a result of the light, there was no shadow on the ground. The reason for this was that it had a unique lighting system.

古建筑的现实重聚 Well-Preserved Ancient Architecture

在教堂左右侧，是欧式建筑的钟楼, 高约二十米，外观呈正方形，四周是用一根一根石柱支撑着，直至顶端形成四个圆锥形直冲云霄。沿着钟楼里的木楼梯往上至楼顶，金堂湖美景一览无余。

左钟楼上挂有一口大铜钟，是当年从法国运来的，虽历经百年，上面的铭文和圣母像依然清晰可见。每个礼拜天，天刚蒙蒙亮，兰神父将钟楼里的古钟撞响，钟声能迅速传到方圆十来公里的地方，天主教徒们闻声赶来。第二次钟响时，所有信徒都已整齐地坐在大厅了。

露德堂的百年历程中，它既是一所教堂，又是一所学堂。

1902年露德堂建成后，教堂内设有读经书的男女学堂各一所，供教友子女学习经典等。1928年，教堂逐步地把经书学堂改为“晨曦小学”，一直沿用至1949年。正兴初中从1957年起租用露德堂做校舍直到1989年，那时已更名为正兴农业中学，并且归还了教堂现存的全部建筑物。这也是露德堂保存之完整、全国都少见的重要原因。

2009年，露德堂成为重庆市级文物保护单位，也是璧山天主教爱国会所在地。这里曾居住过6位外国神父，以及段焕章、陈光普、汪德胜等8位中国籍神父。

如今，露德堂每年除了举行教会活动，也成了举办婚礼的胜地。“每年，这里都会有十多对新人来举行婚礼，都是我主持。”兰神父乐呵呵地说，“2010年6月26日，璧山首届露德葡萄文化节集体婚礼就是在这里举行的，有一万多市民及国际友人到这里，为9对新人祝福。”

On each side of the church stood a Europeanstyle square bell tower, about 20 meters tall,supported by many stone columns around it, and four cones reached for the sky at the top. Climbing up the wooden stairs of the bell tower to the roof of the building, the beautiful scenery of Jintang Lake was unobstructed.

On the left bell tower there hung a large bronze bell, which had been brought in from France.Although after a hundred years, the inscriptions and the statue of the Virgin were still visible. Every Sunday, when the sky had just begun to shine,Father Lan struck the old bell of the bell tower. The bell could reach about tens of kilometers wide, and Catholics would come to the church when they heard the sound. By the second time the bell rang, all the believers had already sat neatly in the hall.

In its century-long history, Ludetang was not only a church but also a school.

After the establishment of Ludetang in 1902, there were two schools for boys and girls of church members to read scriptures respectively, learning the classics,for example. In 1928, the church gradually transformed the Scriptures School into Chenxi Elementary School until 1949. Zhengxing Junior Middle School rented Ludetang as its school building from 1957 to 1989,when it was renamed Zhengxing Agricultural Middle School and all the existing buildings of the church were returned. This was also an important reason for the integrity of the preservation of Ludetang, which is rare throughout the country.

In 2009, Ludetang became a municipal cultural relic conservation unit in Chongqing, and also the seat of Bishan Catholic Patriotic Association.Here has lived six foreign priests, as well as Duan Huanzhang, Chen Guangpu, Wang Desheng and other eight Chinese priests.

Nowadays, in addition to church activities,Ludetang is also a popular place for weddings. “Every year, more than a dozen couples come here for weddings, all of which I host.”Father Lan happily said, “In June 26th, 2010, the first Lude Grape Culture Festival group wedding of Bishan was held here, and more than 10,000 citizens and international friends came here to bless the nine couples.”