"Double standards"... Marine Le Pen's smile with nuns in hoods ignites controversy in France

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A photo taken during the historic visit of Pope Leo The photo was published by the European MP for the National Rally, Mathieu Vallet, on the “X” platform, accompanying it with the phrase “The Renaissance of Beautiful France.”

The scene gained additional sensitivity because of the timing. The photo came just weeks after Le Pen reopened the issue of banning the Islamic hijab in the public sphere, as she announced at the end of August that she wanted, if she reached the Elysee Palace, to put forward a law to combat what she calls “Islamic ideologies” through a referendum, which includes criminalizing the wearing of the Islamic hijab in public places and imposing financial penalties on women who wear it.

Thus, to critics, the image appeared to be a striking visual and political paradox: almost the same religious head covering appears at the heart of a public event linked to the Pope, and a political figure receives it with a smile, while the same party discusses imposing a punishment on Muslim women who wear the hijab in the street.

This comparison is what fueled social networking sites and crystallized in the public debate accusations of a “double standards” policy in dealing with religious manifestations.

But from a legal standpoint, there is a basic point that must be clarified. The Christian nun in the photo was not committing a violation under French law, just as a Muslim woman who wears a hijab that only covers her hair is not committing a violation, at the present time, simply by wearing it in the street.

Current French restrictions vary according to location, job, and type of dress; As for Le Pen’s project, it goes much further than the existing law, by targeting the Islamic veil in the public space.

It is noteworthy that the controversy was not limited to the image. On September 3, Christian and non-Muslim women appeared on social networks wearing the hijab symbolically in solidarity with Muslim women, in protest against the national assembly project. One of the participants said that she is a Christian and is ready to wear the hijab “in support of her sisters,” while clips of other women covering their hair in a message of solidarity spread.

Some police officers also entered the discussion. French media reported that policeman and trade unionist Rudi Manna criticized the idea of ​​entrusting the police with issuing violations against veiled women, saying that the police have other tasks that are more important than this type of violations.

This coincided with the visit of Pope Leo XIV, which turned into a major public and political event in France. Le Pen and Jordan Bardella participated in the mass held by the Pope in the Place de la Concorde in Paris on September 26, amid a large political presence and a crowd estimated at about 800,000 people, according to the Vatican.

On the other hand, the National Rally tried to distinguish between the Christian religion and political Islam. The party's vice president, Sebastien Schonnot, said that his party "fights Islamism and does not fight religion," in response to a question about the Pope's position on secularism and keeping religion in the public sphere.

As for the Pope himself, he said during his visit that “just secularism” does not mean excluding religion from the public sphere, in a statement that French media considered directly relevant to the debate about the hijab, especially since Le Pen’s project is based on the concept of secularism to justify the ban on the Islamic hijab.

Thus, the photo of Le Pen smiling next to a hooded nun went from being a simple snapshot during a papal visit to new material in the French debate on the limits of secularism: should the criterion be the religious form itself, the identity of the person wearing it, or the political message that the dress is supposed to convey? While supporters of the National Rally project believe that the Islamic hijab can, in some cases, represent an expression of “Islamism,” critics believe that singling out the Islamic hijab alone raises a question about equality in applying the principle of secularism.