The Pillar Catholic portal reports on a “provincial ecclesial assembly” in France focused on the surge in adult baptisms, which more than doubled from 2023 to 2026, reaching 21,386 candidates. Organized by the Archdiocese of Paris and scheduled to run from May 2026 to May 2027, the gathering aims to address the integration of these “neophytes” through consultations involving tens of thousands of participants, including Protestants and Orthodox observers, and even utilizing AI for data analysis. While the article presents this as a sign of vitality, a closer examination reveals it as a textbook example of the post-conciliar obsession with external metrics and structural tinkering, utterly blind to the supernatural realities of faith, conversion, and the true mission of the Church.
The Triumph of Statistics Over Souls
The article’s breathless tone—”staggering increase,” “baptism boom,” “filled overnight”—betrays a fundamental misunderstanding of what constitutes genuine spiritual renewal. For the conciliar sect, success is measured in numbers: 8,416 baptisms in 2023, 21,386 in 2026, 3,300 contributions from a consultation of 30,000 people. This is the logic of the marketplace, not the Kingdom of God. As Pope Pius XI taught in Quas Primas, the reign of Christ is not of this world; it is established through repentance, faith, and baptism, which signify an internal rebirth, not a demographic shift. The focus on “managing” this influx—”rethinking the system,” “training for Christian life”—reduces the sacred act of incorporation into the Mystical Body of Christ to a logistical problem of parish administration. Where is the emphasis on the state of grace? On the necessity of contrition? On the eternal destiny of these souls? The silence is deafening, revealing a Church that has forgotten its primary duty: to save souls, not to count them.
The Catechumenal Rite as a Conciliar Facade
The assembly’s very structure exposes its modernist underpinnings. Originally styled a “provincial council,” it was downgraded to an “ecclesial assembly” after Rome objected on canonical grounds—a telling admission that even the sect’s own legal frameworks are too rigid for its innovative spirit. More damning is the inclusion of three Protestants and three Orthodox Christians as observers. This is not dialogue; it is a liturgical and doctrinal scandal. The Catholic Church has always taught, as Pope Pius IX declared in the Syllabus of Errors, that Protestantism is “nothing more than another form of the same true Christian religion” (Proposition 18) is a condemned error, and that the Catholic Church is the only true religion (Proposition 21). To grant schismatics and heretics a formal role in a Catholic assembly is to deny the uniqueness of the Church and to treat revealed truth as a matter of consensus. It is the ecumenism of Dignitatis Humanae made manifest: all paths lead to God, and the Church must adapt its structures to this new reality.
The AI Heresy: Reducing Grace to Data
Perhaps the most grotesque detail is the plan to analyze consultation results “with the help of AI.” This is the logical endpoint of the conciliar revolution: the reduction of the supernatural to the algorithmic. Faith, conversion, the action of grace in the soul—these are to be processed by machines, their patterns identified, their outcomes predicted. It is the ultimate expression of the naturalism condemned by St. Pius X in Lamentabili Sane Exitu, where he rejected the proposition that “the progress of sciences requires a reform of the concept of Christian doctrine concerning God, creation, Revelation, the Person of the Incarnate Word, and Redemption” (Proposition 64). The conciliar sect, having abandoned the supernatural, now seeks to manage the remnants of faith through technology, as if the Holy Spirit were a variable in a data set. This is not pastoral care; it is spiritual engineering, and it is blasphemous.
The Omission of True Conversion
The article quotes journalist Antoine Pasquier, who notes that many young catechumens are drawn to the Church through personal Bible reading and the “confident religious conviction of their Muslim friends.” He even suggests adapting catechesis to their frame of reference, such as presenting Lent as the “Christian Ramadan.” This is not evangelization; it is syncretism. The Catholic faith is not a cultural artifact to be contextualized for consumer appeal. As St. Pius X warned, the pursuit of novelty leads to “deplorable consequences,” including the corruption of dogmas and the abandonment of the Church’s heritage. To present Christianity as a parallel to Islam—fasting as “Ramadan,” baptism as a rite of passage—is to deny the divinity of Christ and the uniqueness of His sacrifice. It is the “indifferentism” condemned by Pius IX: the belief that all religions are equally valid paths to God. The true Church would demand a complete break with error, not a comfortable accommodation to it.
The Limits of the “Catechumenal Church”
Fr. Maximilien de La Martinière, the assembly organizer, states: “The challenge lies in what comes after baptism… We need to rethink the system and ensure that the entire community shares in this mission.” This is the language of corporate restructuring, not of apostolic zeal. The early Church did not hold “ecclesial assemblies” to discuss the integration of neophytes; the Apostles preached, baptized, and handed on the deposit of faith. The “current model has reached its limits,” he says, but the only model that has truly reached its limits is the conciliar model itself—a model built on the ruins of the true Mass, the true sacraments, and the true hierarchy. The solution is not more consultation, more AI, or more ecumenical observers. The solution is a return to the unchanging Tradition of the Church: the Most Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, the true priesthood, and the integral Catholic faith, without compromise with the world.
Conclusion: A Church of Numbers, Not of Saints
The French “baptism boom” is not a sign of the Holy Spirit’s action; it is a symptom of the conciliar sect’s desperate attempt to find relevance in a world it has already surrendered to. By focusing on external growth, embracing ecumenism, and employing technology to manage faith, the assembly reveals a Church that has lost its supernatural horizon. As Pope Pius XI wrote, “When God and Jesus Christ were removed from laws and states… the foundations of that authority were destroyed.” The same is true when God is removed from the Church’s own structures, replaced by data, dialogue, and adaptation. The true Church endures, not in the assemblies of Paris, but in the faithful who profess the integral Catholic faith, who reject the innovations of Vatican II, and who await the restoration of all things in Christ the King. The “catechumenal Church” is a mirage; the true Church is the Ark of Salvation, and outside her there is only shipwreck.
Source:
What’s France’s new assembly on catechumens? (pillarcatholic.com)
Date: 22.05.2026