Tear gas in Paris and Marseille as school protests grow across France as reflected on by Rev. Dr. Christine Althaus
News reports from Paris and Marseille show tear gas drifting through crowded plazas. High school students gather there. They demand basic classroom resources. I sit this morning along our northern lake country shores. The distance might tempt us to dismiss this unrest. We might see it as a distant drama, peculiar to French civic life. Yet, these young people face chemical dispersants. They simply demand adequate funding, dignity, and an end to heavy-handed policing. This exposes a familiar fracture line: our tragic reluctance to honor our covenant with the young. The ongoing school protests France reflect a universal challenge.
Our Lutheran heritage values the education and protection of children. These are not mere budgetary line items. They are not simply utilitarian state programs. Martin Luther himself wrote urgently to civic leaders. He stated that a city’s true wealth does not reside in its treasuries. It is not in stonework or arsenals. Instead, wealth comes from producing well-educated, thoughtful citizens. These citizens can maintain peace and care for their neighbors. Therefore, to starve a public school of resources commits a quiet form of spiritual neglect. It tells the rising generation that their minds and vocational potential are secondary. This message prioritizes political expedience and state retrenchment.
Honoring Our Covenant with Youth
Teenagers take to the streets with placards. They do not act out of malice. Instead, they voice a visceral ache for a compromised inheritance. In our parish, we often speak of ecological stewardship. We remind one another that we do not own the watershed. We hold it in trust for those who come after us. The very same theology applies to civic institutions. Public classrooms are common goods. Like clean headwaters, they nourish the vulnerable. When adults poison the water or hollow out the schoolhouse, we should not act shocked. The thirsting generation will cry aloud. This applies to the school protests France and similar movements elsewhere.
The recourse to tear gas and riot shields against teenage demonstrators marks a profound failure of public grace. A state apparatus responds to legitimate cries for educational equity with physical intimidation. This reveals its own moral exhaustion. Authority that rests upon force, rather than relational trust, forgets its God-given purpose. Its purpose is to cultivate justice and protect the defenseless. When the baton replaces the open ear, civic peace curdles into mere subjugation. This breeds cynicism in hearts that should learn the beauty of civic participation. We must foster dialogue, not violence.
A Call for Collective Will
Here in our rural township, our schools face different surface challenges. These include shrinking tax bases, aging boilers, and long bus routes across gravel roads. Yet, the fundamental moral question remains identical. It is the same question shouted in the avenues of Marseille: Do we possess the collective will to sacrifice our comfort for our young’s well-being? Communal accountability requires that we measure our municipal integrity. We measure it by our classrooms’ vitality and our youth’s emotional safety. We must not measure it by our crowd control’s efficiency.
A society regards its youth as an unruly liability. It does not see them as a sacred deposit of hope. Such a society already decays from within. These young people in France, like high school students in our local districts, ask adults to keep faith. They ask for promises made at baptism and in our social contracts. They ask for books, working heaters, and dedicated instructors. They also ask for the freedom to walk streets without dreading chemical fog. Meeting that longing with defensive violence is an abdication of our vocation as elders and caretakers. The school protests France highlight this critical need.
Christian hope calls us toward restorative civic dialogue. Grievances are heard with humility. Public resources are redirected toward human flourishing. As fumes clear from France’s boulevards, we must pray for those young bodies’ protection. We also pray for the repentance of civic leaders who reached for weapons instead of wisdom. Furthermore, we must examine our own doorsteps. Let us rededicate ourselves to repairing the communal wells from which our children must drink.
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