By Robert Royal
Today is the feast of the North American Martyrs, a group of French Jesuits and religious – Jean de Brébeuf, Isaac Jogues, Jean de Lalande, Antoine Daniel, Gabriel Lalemant, Charles Garnier, Noël Chabanel, and Brother René Goupil. It is worth remembering each one by name, to keep in mind that they were people like us (though more saintly and more heroic), and not simply a distant group from history. They were brave and dedicated men who suffered the most unspeakable horrors – fire, torture, mutilation – on the way to death, while striving to fulfill the Lord’s command to preach the Gospel to all nations.
France, modern France, is now itself going through an agony of fire. It is difficult to determine exactly who is responsible. It is said that everything began as a “student” protest over the lack of teachers and the poor condition of school facilities. But it remains unexplained how those protests could have erupted in multiple places across the country among “student groups” without broad coordination. And, whatever their origin, it is clear that the violence and destruction now come from the extreme left and from the worst elements of France’s large Muslim population. There are reports that even Notre Dame could be threatened, as well as the Élysée Palace, the French White House.
Yet this is not an entirely new phenomenon, and it should draw more attention to the attacks that have been building against French institutions in recent years, and not least against the Church.
Many people were encouraged to see the enthusiastic crowds that gathered during Pope Leo’s visit to France just a few weeks ago. It is also difficult to determine exactly what all that meant. It was very moving to see people kneeling on the sidewalks of the Champs-Élysées to go to confession. But that is only the happy part of the story. For many years now, the Church in France has been under attack, literally, from various fronts.
The Faith & Reason Institute, the parent institution of The Catholic Thing, has been working on a project in cooperation with Aid to the Church in Need USA, which we have called “Faith Under Siege.” We focus mainly on the evident cases of persecution and, yes, modern martyrdom in Muslim nations these days – Nigeria, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Somalia, Yemen, etc. – and in totalitarian states such as China, North Korea, Cuba, Nicaragua, and others. But in the course of our research we have also discovered that there is an anti-Christian current, subtle and not so subtle, even in Western Europe, although it is hardly reported.
When there is an evident case, such as the murder of Father Jacques Hamel in 2016 at the hands of two radicalized young Muslims (and the less publicized murders of Catholics at Mass shortly afterward), the world pays attention for a week or two and then moves on to something else. But beneath the most flagrant facts there is a pattern.
The world was shocked this weekend by images of the historic town hall of Limoges in flames and its tower collapsing after rioters set it on fire. But French authorities have been saying for years that, on average, two religious buildings are burned each month in France. And that despite the government’s considerable efforts to protect them.
Everyone remembers, of course, the mysterious 2019 fire that nearly destroyed Notre Dame of Paris. But the cathedral of Saint-Maclou/Saint-Jacques in Rouen also burned in 2024. That same year, the Basilica of the Immaculate Conception in Saint-Omer was also damaged by an intentional fire. The list goes on, and these high-profile cases are only the tip of the iceberg. Hundreds of smaller churches, shrines, statues, etc., have suffered similar attacks or serious acts of vandalism.
Now, of course, the fires have multiple causes. Some are accidental, perhaps a third, due to faulty electrical installations, aging infrastructure, and the like. But French authorities estimate that two-thirds are intentional. It is not difficult to suppose – because some perpetrators have been caught in the act – that many of them are the work of Muslims, and another part, of native French people who are anti-Catholic. And then there are the usual disturbed individuals, occasional vandals, and antisocial elements.
It is curious that the major media have gotten into these data trying to downplay the anti-Christian element, even though the French government – hardly a bastion of Christian chauvinism – sees things very differently. As in the United States, the riots, looting, and vandalism are presented in the media as the result of material causes – poverty, inequality, racism – all the usual sociological categories, as if religious belief were never radical or hardly influenced anything happening in society, except when it comes to Christian intolerance.
And when hundreds of thousands, perhaps even a million French people, come out to welcome a Pope, that can provoke in some media the “fear” of the astonishing and persistent capacity of the Catholic Church to attract people, even if they are not particularly devout or do not attend Mass very often.
And it is not only France. When Pope Leo went to Spain, an estimated 1.2 million people attended his Mass in Madrid. It was mentioned briefly and then filed away as merely “religious.” Yet if that many people had come out for a protest against Trump, an LGBT pride event, or a pro-Palestinian demonstration, we would be hearing ad nauseam how significant it was and to what extent it represented a change in society – a change that media coverage would try to push even further.
Even when the media have a Pope they like, the coverage is minimal. Who remembers today, for example, that 3 million people came out to see Pope Francis in Brazil in 2013, and at least a million in Ecuador in 2015?
If Pope Leo’s health allows him to make the extensive trip to Latin America planned for next month, equally huge and enthusiastic crowds can be expected as in France and Spain.
Many parts of the world – not only France, but also Ukraine, Gaza, the West Bank, Iran, Saudi Arabia, Yemen, and others – may be burning, but elsewhere a fire is being kindled with a very different purpose.
About the Author
Robert Royal is editor-in-chief of The Catholic Thing and president of the Faith & Reason Institute in Washington, D.C. His most recent books are The Martyrs of the New Millennium: The Global Persecution of Christians in the Twenty-First Century, Columbus and the Crisis of the West, and A Deeper Vision: The Catholic Intellectual Tradition in the Twentieth Century.