Pope Leo celebrated an open-air Mass at the Place de la Concorde in Paris on Saturday before a crowd the Vatican estimated at 800,000 — the largest event of his four-day visit to France, and roughly 200,000 more people than had registered to attend.
Crowds began moving towards the Champs-Élysées in grey light before dawn for the 3 p.m. (1300 GMT) service, Hiru News reported in an advance account carrying more than 600,000 registered attendees. Police closed the streets around the boulevard, where Leo was driven in an open-top popemobile along the avenue running from the Arc de Triomphe down to the square.
The two figures reconcile: the Vatican’s estimate of 800,000 is precisely the 200,000 above pre-registration that Al Jazeera reported.
“From this beautiful city of Paris, I pray fervently that the living water of the Holy Spirit may flow throughout France,” Leo told the crowd, urging them to “let it overflow, so that those you meet may be refreshed and their thirst satisfied.”
He blessed children brought forward from the crowd during the parade. French First Lady Brigitte Macron attended, as did Marine Le Pen.
A church trying to recover its standing
Leo is on a whirlwind four-day, three-city tour of France, where he is seeking to repair the Catholic Church’s standing after abuse scandals that caused nationwide shock. Neither account we fetched names the third city.
The visit lands in a country where the separation of church and state has been enshrined in law since 1905 and where affiliation has fallen sharply. The official statistics agency INSEE found that just 25% of French people aged 18 to 49 identify as Catholic, against 43% a decade earlier.
The French Bishops’ Conference points the other way, citing a record 21,000 adult baptisms last Easter. Meeting newly baptised Catholics at the Catholic University of Paris on Saturday, Leo cautioned the French church against reading too much into that.
“We must recognise, welcome and protect the small flame that the Holy Spirit has kindled in the darkness of the night, the tiny seed that strives to grow even amid the thorns,” he said, warning against being “naively optimistic” about the increase.
Multilateralism and AI
In a speech on Friday at the Paris headquarters of UNESCO, the UN’s culture and education body, Leo said the United Nations and other multilateral organisations were in crisis — continuing a run of pointed criticism of the direction of global leadership.
He also repeated a warning he has made frequently about artificial intelligence, telling French leaders that AI could produce a future in which “a paradise of machines” takes control of the Earth.
Lourdes next
Leo travelled on to Lourdes, site of one of Catholicism’s best-known shrines, on Saturday night. He is due to meet seven French victims of clerical abuse there on Sunday.
