@larroumecj:
We are at the confluence of two distinct civilizational phenomena leading to revolution:
The first: in a democratic society, as Tocqueville noted, every inequality quickly becomes unbearable because there are only two ways to explain why some people succeed better than oneself: corruption of the system or merit.
And psychologically, unsurprisingly, we tend to think that those who succeed better than us benefit from a corrupt system rather than being more deserving.
Democracy is therefore a regime that structurally creates armies of the discontented, except when there is strong economic growth.
Because then one can reasonably bide one's time, telling oneself that in a few years, one will oneself be at the same level as those one envies.
It has been 15 years since there has been any growth in France.
Younger generations do not believe their situation will naturally catch up to that of the more privileged.
As a result, they no longer have much interest in keeping the system alive. All the more so since, often having no children and not being homeowners, they are subject to none of the traditional conservative forces.
The second: as Schumpeter noted, capitalism, by exploding industrial and agricultural productivity, reduces to a pittance the number of manual jobs. Society thus begins to produce gigantic cohorts of people trained in intellectual professions, even as the economy does not need so many people in those sectors. No matter how much we multiply bullshit jobs, we nevertheless produce a large number of educated and unemployable individuals. (They consider manual jobs not dignified enough.)
These cohorts are structurally revolutionary because they see themselves as an enlightened elite in opposition to the existing system.
France is one of the world's most tertiary economies and has one of the highest percentages of individuals pursuing higher education.
It has had no growth for 15 years.
Kaboom, then?
Not yet, because there is, however, a component of society that has an absolute interest in maintaining the system as it is: retirees.
And they represent a third of the electorate.
Their role is ambivalent: they prevent destructive revolution just as much as any reform capable of making the system viable.
This is thus one of the key tasks of politics today: to restart economic growth and redirect wealth toward the active population, while succeeding both in bypassing retirees' blockages and containing the revolutionary impulses of youth.
This is just one of France's many urgent projects in this period of multiple crises.
But with the approaching financial crisis, the debt buffer is coming to an end. The fundamental question of whom and what the French economic machine serves can no longer remain without a satisfactory answer for long.






PITTSBURGH (LifeSiteNews) — Bishop Robert Mutsaerts said that Catholics who attend parishes with irreverent Novus Ordo Masses should find a Traditional Latin Mass (TLM) or another reverent liturgy instead of attempting to transform their home parish.
During a brief October 3 interview with LifeSite after his talk at the 2026 Catholic Identity Conference (CIC), Mutsaerts responded to a question about whether the faithful should try to improve their home parish with a bad liturgy or attend the TLM.
Mutsaerts, a conservative Dutch bishop who only knows how to celebrate the Novus Ordo, stressed that trying to improve bad parishes is futile. Instead, laypeople should go somewhere where their faith and that of their families is actually nourished.
Attending a parish that nourishes your faith
“If there’s a bad Novus Ordo Mass, you can’t improve those priests, I’m afraid. So just go anywhere else,” Mutsaerts told LifeSite. “I used to think, ‘Support your own parish.’ I’m not saying that anymore … because you might lose your faith there. Go somewhere where you think, ‘This is right, this is authentic, this is true.'”
“Go there, and if you have children or youngsters, go where they’ll meet other young people. That’s what stimulates,” he added. “And young people, they meet one another in the Vetus Ordo, the Novus Ordo, but (at) places where they find the sacred, where the liturgy is in order … You need some encouragement (from your parish community), you don’t get it if you’re 18 and all the rest (of the parishioners) are 80.”
In recent months, several Catholic thinkers have debated whether the faithful should try to fix their geographical parish, as Catholic writer Patrick Neve argued in a January Substack post titled “The parish you hate might need you.” Still, others have agreed with Mutsaerts in saying it is more important to attend Mass where you are spiritually fulfilled, even if that requires driving a long distance.
Keeping the faith in a period of ‘synodality’
On keeping the faith as the Church hierarchy promotes synodality, one of the themes of his conference talk, Mutsaerts encouraged the faithful to cling to the Church’s traditional practices while slamming the “fruits of synodality.”
“Well, do the regular (Catholic) things. Go to a Mass where there’s proper liturgy, pray the rosary, give a good example (to others),” he said. “And if synodality doesn’t mean anything to you, don’t go there; it’s a waste of time. We’ve been going on eight years, and can you see the fruits? I can’t. Nothing but a waste of time.”
“In the meantime, just stick to the regular Catholic things, as I just mentioned a few of them. Like the Catholic Church always has, try and find the truth; the truth will set you free,” he added.
More: https://m.facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=pfbid06Hrcc65qcMdWSk1mVbAKx7PzMrXV44qyHaAg18wLVcYMYZDKffY9Mz3wkAGkYU69l&id=100064701575399