Paris (France) (AFP) – Letter to the Pope or installation of Calvaries, radical far-right activists from different political groups are multiplying religious references, the beginning of a rapprochement with Catholicism which has become for them a tool of recruitment and political struggle.

Published on: 09/11/2026 - 14:58

The nationalist group “Des Tours et des lys” had planned a torchlight march in Tours on Saturday in honor of Saint Martial, after placing a cross at the entrance to the Mettray cemetery in Touraine in April. He gave it up. The prefecture had banned all demonstrations in the city center.

In September, the nationalists of Luminis, followers of conferences in a Christian parlor in Paris, announced that they had sent a missive to Leo XIV to criticize, among other things, immigration.

In February, a rally in the capital ended with a “Hail Mary” in tribute to radical far-right activist Quentin Deranque, who was beaten to death in Lyon. From Angers, Jean-Eudes Gannat, founder of the small nationalist group Alvarium dissolved in 2021, invited people to recite rosaries for the deceased.

Whether they belong to political identity groups, which appeared around twenty years ago in France, or whether they are nationalist-revolutionaries (older neofascist movement), they come together in the same references to a cultural Catholicism, an attachment to the Catholic heritage without necessarily an associated faith.

“A change” runs through this myriad of small, heterogeneous political groups which, according to the authorities, have around 3,300 members, notes a well-informed source on condition of anonymity.

Certainly "Catholicism, in its traditionalist version, has never disappeared on the far right", but after having been considered by certain activists as "old-fashioned", it is now seen as a "political asset". Including among "some of the most neo-Nazis" who denigrated Christianity as "a religion not only 'oriental' but also Jewish."

In recent years, "ideological hybridizations" have taken place among this minority of radical activists which have resulted in "syncretism", adds this source. And to cite the example of the former leader of Zouaves Paris, Marc de Cacqueray-Valmenier, “neo-Nazi tattoos on one leg, traditional Catholics on the other”.

The nationalist-revolutionaries, previously "very marked by esotericism", are now turning towards a "tinkered Catholicism", inspired in particular by the mobilization of the Manif pour tous in 2013. Among the identitarians, "there is a practical-practical side: we recruit, so we put sacrament into our paganism", adds this source.

- “Politicizing religion” -

“What is really new in this fringe” of identity activists, notes Marion Jacquet-Vaillant, lecturer in political science at Paris-Panthéon-Assas, is that “historically” they “have an extremely critical discourse vis-à-vis Christianity”.

"They were rather historically descendants of the New Right" which "had been keen, in the 1970s, to reconnect with what they considered to be the true religion of Europeans, that is to say neopaganism", explains the author of "Les Identitaires. Investigation at the margins of politics".

Then, she said, the 2015 attacks in France “were seen as the incursion of religion into politics” and “led to the politicization of religion as an inverse reference”. This translates into “very concrete things, like participation in processions” in Nice.

Or collages of silhouettes of saints with the legend “Defend your land and your faith”, made in October in Paris by Les Natifs, an heir group of Génération identitaire dissolved in 2021.

"Legacy"

Among identitarians, "there is no longer any neo-pagan worship as was the case in the 70s", testifies Louise Garnier, activist at Les Natifs.

This neoconvert, baptized in 2023 at the age of 22, affirms that the actions of the Natives aim to “defend beauty in Paris”.

“Our heritage is very marked by culture and Christian faith,” and the message through the Catholic symbols used by the Natives “is above all that of a Christian heritage, not a Catholic message,” she explains.

The Natives, who displayed a banner with racist connotations targeting the Franco-Malian singer Aya Nakamura in Paris in 2024, support a policy of mass expulsion of people of foreign origin which they intend to bring to the debate before the presidential election.

The student says she sees no contradiction with the universalist message of the Church: "it is compatible with Catholicism" because "loving your neighbor means wanting to give them dignified living conditions."

“My faith is the most important thing for me, before politics,” she says, to the point that “I do not interfere in a movement that goes against my Catholic ideas.”

© 2026 AFP

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