Pope heads to secular France with an appeal to respect the dignity of every human life

VATICAN CITY (AP) — Pope Leo XIV is taking his call to respect the dignity of every human life on the road with a weekend visit to France, where the Catholic Church has lost ground on influencing ethical issues as the country maintains a strict approach to secularism .

Leo is spending four intense days in Paris, the Catholic shrine at Lourdes and the northeastern city of Metz. He's hoping to draw attention to his appeals for peace at a time of war, and for greater reflection as artificial intelligence questions the very essence of what it means to be human.

Church bells across France are expected to toll at 10 a.m. Friday, when Leo’s charter flight lands at Paris’ Orly airport, and upward of a million people are expected to turn out to see him. The welcome has underscored the surprising level of interest in Leo’s visit, the first by a pope in 18 years.

Leo was to meet with President Emmanuel Macron at the airport upon arrival and then again at the Élysée Palace. During his busiest day of the trip, Leo was to then deliver a speech at UNESCO headquarters, celebrate vespers at the newly reopened Notre-Dame cathedral and then preside over a massive youth vigil at the Paris stadium Friday night.

For Macron, who is barred from seeking a third term in May elections, hosting the American pope is something of a capstone, after Pope Francis refused repeatedly to make a proper state visit to France during his 12-year pontificate.

“For a president of the republic as Macron, who is at the end of his mandate, it can be important to be aside the pope and to capture a part of his popularity. It’s not new,” said Charles Mercier, director of history and sociology of Catholicism studies at Paris EPHE university.

With seven months left in his term, Macron’s approval ratings are near record lows, driven by anger over the rising cost of living and criticism of France’s growing debt and deficit and deteriorating public services. Macron’s office said Friday’s meeting with Leo will provide an opportunity to discuss global challenges such as climate change and artificial intelligence, along with European and international affairs. The talks also are expected to address end-of-life care and the protection of children.

Leo seems keen to emphasize Europe’s Christian roots and try to push the church’s message about the value and dignity of human life in a country where the right to abortion was enshrined in the Constitution in 2024 and where lawmakers recently gave final approval to a bill allowing adults with incurable illnesses to receive lethal medication.

The French Catholic hierarchy strongly opposed the measures, in keeping with Catholic teaching that human life must be protected and defended from conception until natural death. But the French hierarchy has lost much of its influence amid the secularizing trends at play across Western Europe as well as a credibility crisis stemming from France’s reckoning with its legacy of clergy sexual abuse.

France’s distinctive model of secularism, known as laïcité and enshrined in its Constitution, guarantees the freedom to believe or not to believe , as well as the freedom to practice a religion as long as it doesn't disturb public order. It also requires the state to remain neutral toward all religions.

Key rules have been defined by a historic 1905 law, primarily intended to distance the state from the then-powerful influence of the Catholic Church.

Leo, whose paternal ancestors were French, isn’t expected to scold the French over the abortion and end-of-life legislation. Rather, he's expected to summon them to a fundamental, higher-altitude consideration about what it means to be human today, said the Vatican’s editorial director Andrea Tornielli.

“The pope is not landing in the City of Light to condemn anyone, nor to barge into the French political debate, which is as polarized as that of every other European country,” Tornielli wrote in Vatican News. “He comes as a shepherd to meet a people, their history, and their culture.”

Olympic-level security measures were being put in place, including mounted police, bomb disposal experts, anti-drone measures and counter-terrorism measures, said Paris police prefecture spokesperson Hélène Denéchère.

In Paris alone, plans called for 14,000 police officers, gendarmes, and military personnel and 2,500 firefighters on Friday. On Saturday, when Leo celebrates Mass at the central Place de la Concorde, the numbers are only slightly lower.

“We are implementing a system similar to what was in place during the Paris 2024 Olympic and Paralympic Games, which means a protective perimeter around which other security perimeters will be added,” Denéchère said.

Visual journalist Jeffrey Schaeffer contributed from Paris.

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