A Mass with Pope Leo XIV drew several hundred thousand people to Paris’s Place de la Concorde on Saturday; official figures said about 600,000 had registered to attend. It was the first papal visit to Paris since Benedict XVI came in 2008.
Leo is making his first visit to France since his election as pope last year. At a Friday meeting with President Emmanuel Macron, he praised France as “the country of human rights” but criticized a new law permitting assisted suicide and the constitutional protection of the right to abortion. Large areas around the Champs-Élysées and across the Seine were cordoned off for security.
The French Bishops’ Conference said 13,000 adults were baptized in France this year, three times as many as a decade ago; infant baptisms have fallen by more than half since 2000. Leo met recently baptized adults on Saturday and urged them to remain steadfast in their faith and spread it. He was due to travel to Lourdes later Saturday; Metz, where he is due to speak about Europe, is scheduled to be his final stop on Monday.
