During his Wednesday address in St. Peter’s Square, Pope Leo XIV reflected on his recent four-day apostolic visit to France, noting that there is an unmistakable “renewal” underway in the formerly majority-Catholic nation.
While some Catholics are excited over the prospect that the same country that waded into the modern age through the blood of Catholic clerics and lay people might now be returning to the faith, radical leftists and a Muslim activist group are alternatively panicking.
‘The American Catholics will now flood the world with their soft power.’
‘Rebirth’
The Roman pontiff claimed in his address on Wednesday that the Cathedral of Notre-Dame in Paris “can symbolically shed light on this entire Apostolic Journey, offering a perspective that I would summarize in one word: rebirth.”
The cathedral, which was gutted centuries ago by French revolutionaries and again in April 2019 by a devastating fire, “has been rebuilt and is more splendid than ever,” said the pope. “That disaster sparked a positive reaction at every level, some more visible and practical, others more hidden and of a spiritual nature.”
The pope noted that the cathedral is but the “image of the Church made up of living stones, of the holy people of God.”
Having observed the French come out to Mass en masse, the pope proclaimed, “This is the true reconstruction, the restoration of the Church that only God can bring about, through the intercession of the Virgin Mary.”
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Simone Risoluti – Vatican Media/Vatican Pool/Getty Images
Over 80,000 young people packed the Stade de France stadium north of Paris for a prayer vigil with the pope on Friday; an estimated 700,000 people joined Pope Leo for Mass on Saturday in the center of Paris where Louis XVI was guillotined; and over 150,000 people joined the pope for Mass in Lourdes on Sunday.
Corentin Dugast, the French author who goes by “Un Homme Catholique” online, told the National Catholic Register that the pope’s visit helped “put a lasting end to the timidity surrounding the faith, particularly among bishops, who sometimes seem afraid of their own shadow and reluctant to proclaim the gospel when it challenges the world.”
While there was clearly widespread enthusiasm over his visit, Pope Leo — who on Monday emphasized that “one cannot speak of Europe without mentioning Christianity” — noted that signs of Catholic renewal in France predated his visit and have been “evident for some years now, namely the remarkable and growing number of young people and adults seeking baptism.”
Whereas 4,278 adults were baptized in 2022, 13,234 adults and 8,152 teenagers were baptized at Easter this year, according to the French Bishops’ Conference.
Opposition
The usual suspects have begun fretting about France’s potential return to its ancient faith.
Someone from Miséricorde pour l’Humanité France, an Islamic propaganda outfit that targets traditional Catholics, for one described feeling “sad,” “helpless,” and apparently resigned that “France will become Catholic again.”
According to an X translation, Miséricorde pour l’Humanité France complained on the first day of the pope’s visit to France, “I feel sad when I see all this fervor surrounding Catholicism; I’ve been predicting this for years, and I feel like a CIA agent helplessly witnessing the return of the Soviet Union. In 45 years, France will become Catholic again, and we’ll be left with nothing but our tears.”
“I’m a good sport, nevertheless the Catholics are much better organized, as well as more determined, than us Muslims and even than the Zionists; you have to know how to recognize the strength of the Catholic international,” the Muslim group member continued. “The American Catholics will now flood the world with their soft power, to the detriment of both Muslim spiritual hegemony in Western Europe and the Zionist lobby.”
Charlie Hebdo, the satirical publication whose Paris office was targeted in a 2015 Muslim terrorist attack that claimed the lives of 17 people, also lamented some of the images out of the pope’s visit.
Deputy editor Jean-Loup Adenor concern-mongered during a recent TV panel discussion about the sight of Catholics engaged in the sacrament of confession on the streets of Paris during the pope’s visit. According to a Google translation of his remarks, Adenor said, “When I see confessors hearing people’s confessions — my reflex is to recoil.”
Adenor — whose publication routinely mocks Christ, Christianity, and the Catholic Church without consequence — noted further that he feels the need to strip away “the mystique” of the pope and “bring him down to earth,” in part because Pope Leo “is someone capable of mobilizing Catholics in a country like France — a country where religious engagement is often a battleground, and where politics and faith intersect.”
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The so-called National Federation of Freethought advanced the suggestions that the pope’s visit was a “violation of international law” and that “only lackeys and compulsive kneelers refuse to see that this is clearly a religious and pastoral visit intended to glorify and exalt the Catholic faith.”
The radical organization also complained about the predominantly Catholic private education system’s receipt of public education funds; the pope’s condemnation of euthanasia; and supposed violations of the codified separation of church and state.
French news outlet Le Monde decided the pope’s visit was an opportune time to frame the Catholic faith’s resurgence in France as a potential problem, primarily because of its rightist support.
After noting that “bishops and priests are now witnessing a distinct resurgence of interest across their dioceses and parishes” and pointing out that “churches in working-class neighborhoods [are] filling up again on Sundays,” Le Monde’s Sarah Belouezzane pushed an anonymous priest’s claim that “a more political form of Catholicism exists today — and is increasingly prevalent, particularly on the right.”
Le Monde warned that while there are progressive forces within the Church, there are also “highly conservative — or even reactionary — forces aligned with the ideas of certain politicians seeking to promote the concept of an ‘eternal France’ (inherently white and Catholic).”
While the Catholic Church appears to be enjoying a comeback in France, it has a long way to go given only 29% of the urban population identifies as Catholic, according to National Institute of Statistics and Economic Studies data from 2020.
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Catholic, Christianity, Faith, France, Leftist, Muslim, Politics, Pope leo xiv, Revival, Secular
