But then the Vietminh were hte ones who defeated the Japanese in 1945, and then the French just walked in and seized control
So in may ways the communists were the freedom fighter as the non-Communist parties had been decimated by the French -- unlike the Brits who realized that some political freedom can ease tensions (as the Brits did in India with the foundation of the Indian national Congress)...
the Cure of Ars -- thank you for pointing out that information. I found this on wikipedia As parish priest, Vianney realized that the Revolution's aftermath had resulted in religious ignorance, due to the destruction of the Catholic Church in France. At the time, Sundays in rural areas were spent working in the fields, or dancing and drinking in taverns. Vianney was astonished, especially since Sundays were meant to be reserved for religion.
The Old Regime in France was too tied to the Church. Note that in all of the countries where the Church (whether Catholic or Anglican or Calvinist or Lutheran) was tied to the government), in all of those places, the Church has been weakened severely
in contrast in Italy where the Church was strong but seen as an outsider to the government and in Poland where even in the Polish-Lithuanian commonwealth (the largest country in Europe from 1410 until 1634 and one of the largest until its partitions in 1773-1792) was one where Churches were held in importance but was not dominant
In France post the excesses of Louis XIV, the people turned against everything old.
As an aside in 1783 the population of France was 25% of the population of Europe at 24 million people. Italy was another 18 million, but the UK was 7 million, Germany was 18 million, Poland-Lithuania was 8 million, Russia including its Asian parts (which were small at that time) was 12 million, the lowland countries were 8 million
France had this population explosion but did not have any people's rights.
Incidently do note that the first "people's revolution" was in the UK and the slaughter that followed and the rise of a dictator (Oliver Cromwell) who threatened other parts of Europe mirrors the role of Napoleon 150 years later and Stalin 250 years later...
Religion was banned in many places and Churches were converted into "temples to the higher righteousness"
for 20 years Christianity was hit and in many places -- especially the north, it never recovered in France
The Church tried to push back in the 1880s but due to the unforeseen passing of laicite in the early 1900s, the anti-clerical movement reached its peak and that's what we see now in France
In Germany the destruction started with the forced Prussian Union when the elector-King of Prussia (a Calvinist) forcibly made the Calvinists and Lutherans unite and then due to the insurmountable differences, this essentially made the Union Church a branch of the government. Toss in Bismarck's anti-Catholic Kulturkampf and the Germans were ripe for Aryan Christianity -- it was ordered by the government after all...
In the UK, I don't really understand it at all and see no explanation beyond the flower-power generation (but that's also very vague)
Anyway, back to the topic, post the Revolution, the French were signed off religion, forcibly in many cases and religion died off with the killing of religious people etc. It recovered to some extent by the late 1800s and early 1900s, but then WWI and WWII struck and then the 60s and from the 60s onwards we see the massive decline.
I don't know why they didn't realize their own history
They could have imported Christians from Africa and Asia or other parts of Europe if they needed cheap labor
I don't understand it except if I look at it as a result of the secularization of life in France-Germany-the UK.
The Knights Templars were a professional standing Army along with the Knights Hospitallers etc.
The French kingdom until Phillip the Fair (under the senior house of the Capetians) was little more than a cult of personality and with control over only a small part of France -- the Angevin kings controlled the entire western coast until King John's time. diverting -- the Angevin kings in the period 1140 - 1400 built up an impressive set of holdings -- they ruled in England and controlled Scotland, Ireland and Wales, they ruled in Normandy, Gascony, Anjou (the entire Atlantic coast of France), they ruled the house of Aragon and all of eastern Spain, they ruled over Sardinia, Sicily, southern Italy. One branch became king of Hungary and of Poland and his daughter, Jadwiga married Duke Jagiełło of Lithuania to form the Polish-Lithuanian commonwealth
Philip the Fair created a bureaucracy and combatted this. He created much of the "idee France" but he needed money to do this -- and the Templars had this. In the end it was a sordid affair to get money and he destroyed the finest standing army in Europe to get it
The curse put upon his house also held and after him, the senior line of the Capetians died out....
The best European conquerors were the Russians,Portuguese, Brits and Spanish in that order -- even those who hated them like the Irish or Indians -- grudgingly took some of their standards as their own (* in Russia's case, note that this is actually the empire of Muscowy and it conquered the Finnic lands to the north and conquered the other Rus lands to the south and west and then conquered Kazan, Astrakhan, Crimea from the Tartars - or as some say assimilated with the Tartars and then conquered the native peoples of Siberia -- they still rule their empire)
The French were mediocre and the worst were the Dutch and Belgians -- their former colonies hate them for the utter rape of these lands