Église Saint-Jean-Baptiste de Vif, Church building in Vif, Isère, France

The Église Saint-Jean-Baptiste de Vif is a parish church in the centre of Vif, built of pale stone and rough masonry. Its tall square bell tower, rebuilt on the right side of the choir from 1686 and topped with a spire in 1709, has a low pyramidal roof and a smaller pinnacle. To its right, a lower round apse with a conical tiled roof is pierced by two tall arched windows, and a sloping tiled roof covers the nave between tower and apse.

The church grew out of the Benedictine priory of Vif, founded in 1035 after donations by the landowner Béthon; in 1130 Saint-Jean-Baptiste was attached to it and served as both abbey and parish church. Huguenot troops sacked and burned it in 1562 and again in June 1573, when the duc de Lesdiguères took Vif and had its vaults pulled down. Restored in 1630, it lost its first bell tower in 1685 and received the rebuilt one, on the opposite side, between 1686 and 1709.

The church is dedicated to John the Baptist, patron of Vif. In 1632 the Jesuit Father Aubert established the Confraternity of the Holy Sacrament here; its members, called pénitents, met in the chapel on the first floor of the Porch Tower until the brotherhood was dissolved in 1825. Wall paintings on the side aisles were uncovered in 2007.

The main entrance is on the west side, under the Porch Tower, on the north side of Avenue Rivalta (D1075), at the boundary between the Pied du Bourg and Tête du Bourg quarters. The church stands in the old centre-bourg, 16 km south of Grenoble in the Gresse valley. The former cloister site lies along today's Avenue de Rivalta, south of the facade.

The bell tower that collapsed in 1685 stood left of the choir; Bishop Étienne Le Camus had it rebuilt on the right side instead, with work running from 1686 until the spire was set in 1709. A commemorative inscription was set into the tower's corner at that time.