Paix liturgique

The Letter of Paix Liturgique of June 12 (Paix Liturgique France) recounted how a number of Catholics who tried to prevent the Nuit Blanche event at the Parisian church of Saint-Laurent were treated. I would like to revisit in greater detail this very significant alliance between the Church today and this kind of “artistic” creations. And I would also like to say that, for us, the Parisian Sentinels who tirelessly protest against the restrictions imposed by Archbishops Aupetit and later Ulrich on the Traditional Mass in Paris, this theatricalization of the capital's churches under the guise of a contemporary, prophane, and sometimes profanatory religiosity, is unbearable.

Nuit Blanche, or sleepless night, is the name of an annual cultural event held over one night, encompassing numerous so-called “artistic” events in the streets and in public and private spaces. It was inaugurated in Paris in 2002 by the mayor Bertrand Delanoë. It is the quintessential Parisian event of the "bobo" (bourgeois-bohemian) style, where "bobos" invent "bobo" events for a "bobo" audience.

This year, 2026, it was held on June 6th, and the Paris City Hall, now led by Emmanuel Grégoire (who recently commissioned the artist JR to cover the Pont Neuf, Paris's most venerable bridge, with an inflatable plastic snow grotto), entrusted the organization of this "cultural" event to Barbara Butch, a feminist, lesbian, and obese activist who fights against fatphobia, homophobia, and other carefully chosen "phobias."

She had participated as an entertainer during the 2024 Olympic Games with a tableau vivant depicting the Last Supper on Holy Thursday. She appeared as a haloed "Christ," surrounded by drag queen "apostles," one of whom was naked and painted blue. This blasphemous event provoked strong reactions among many of the faithful, and the Holy See expressed its "sorrow" and deplored the "allusions that ridicule religious beliefs." Jean-Luc Mélenchon himself echoed the concern of his dismayed voters: "What is the point of risking hurting believers?"

The 2026 Nuit Blanche (with an approximate budget of 1.5 million euros) had "love" as its theme. Declarations of love from couples of all kinds were projected onto trucks throughout the capital, bearing the slogan "On s’aime," decorated with large hearts. For these Nuit Blanche events, Emmanuel Grégoire and Barbara Butch sought to involve Parisian churches in the program by creating contemporary art installations, including immersive sound experiences in several churches, some with a “religious” resonance. Of course, the law and legal precedents regarding the separation of church and state required the consent of the priests involved and, consequently, the archbishop.

These are the churches that participated in Nuit Blanche: Notre-Dame d’Espérance, with a “participatory performance” conceived around the compositions of the artist Floe; Saint-Laurent, with an immersive sound installation by researcher Marie-Luce Nadal that brought together “anonymous prayers, wishes, and confidences collected from around the world, and then transformed into a living sonic material”; and Saint-Louis d’Antin, with a bronze sculpture by Hacene Sadoune depicting Christ bearing the wounds of our time: wars, violence, and human fractures. The chapel of Saint-Louis de la Salpêtrière presented an immersive installation on the the hospital's history. The parish priest of Notre-Dame des Blancs-Manteaux, from the Saint-Martin community, had agreed to participate, but by organizing a concert by the Acœurvoix association, featuring works by Clara Schumann, Hildegard von Bingen, Cécile Chaminade, and Isabelle Aboulker.

The fundamental problem lies in the very fact that Church leaders in Paris agreed to participate in such an event—the most worldly of all, in the sense used by Christ when He speaks of the “world” in the Gospel of John—and moreover, an event presented in a seductive fashion, with its often repugnant allusions, of a left-wing contemporary art that lives off generous public subsidies exclusively.

Faced with this pathetic collaboration, we all recall the multicolored cape worn by Bishop Ulrich at the inauguration of Notre-Dame, which rose from its ashes. As Olivier Frèrejacques says in Liberté Politique (“Barbara Butch Scandal: The Church of France or the Silence of the Lambs,” https://share.google/QgIjsdJxR0SfTT2ur): “That the Socialist mayor of Paris, implicated in serious cases of pedo-criminality within the framework of the périscolaire, is promoting this type of event is hardly surprising. On the other hand, it is fair to question the motivations of the priests in the parishes involved and the archbishop who agreed to organize such an event. Watching the videos made public cannot leave any Catholic indifferent. A few courageous Christians opposed these spectacles and were quickly arrested, with a diligence that law enforcement does not always demonstrate in other circumstances.” And he added: “The diocesan authorities remain silent, either out of fear of the reaction from the media and the political world, or because they have nothing to reproach Barbara Butch and her circus in the churches for.”

These same authorities who allowed the Nuit Blanche in five churches also interdicted the traditional Mass in five others:

- Wednesday, Thursday, and Sunday morning Masses at Saint-Georges de La Villette;

- Sunday afternoon Mass at Notre-Dame du Travail.

 - Monday Mass in Sainte-Clotilde;

- Wednesday Mass for students and the monthly Sunday afternoon Mass for the Scouts and Guides in Saint-François-Xavier;

- Friday Mass at the Notre-Dame de la Visitation chapel for IPC students;

These were obviously not “immersive sound experiences” or “participatory performances,” but simply Catholic Masses. In protest against their unjust ban and in defense of their reinstatement, the Parisian Sentinels pray their rosaries at 10 rue du Cloître-Notre-Dame, Monday through Friday, starting at 1:00 p.m. until 13:30, at Saint-Georges de La Villette, 114 avenue Simon Bolivar, on Wednesdays and Fridays at 17:00, in front of Notre-Dame du Travail, on Sundays at 18:15.