Easter of 2023 had already attracted attention in France due to the number of persons baptized: 8,324 adults and adolescents, 2,400 more than the year before. Initially, some attributed the phenomenon to the Covid lockdowns. But, since there, people have noticed a mysterious effect of “contagion”: after life went back to normal, the numbers continued to rise. In 2024, those baptized numbered 12,000. Before these facts, the Church in France was left speechless. Something was happening -it appeared to say- of which we are not the authors; we must follow what is happening.
For two years now, I have collaborated with a small group here in Grenoble that accompanies young people between 18 and 35 to the sacraments of Christian initiation (Baptism, Confirmation and First Communion) in the parish of St. Joseph. Sunday Mass is a surprising experience. In all of the great basilica -super cold because it is too expensive to heat it, with an apse that is cracked and a carpet that is temporary, although clean- it is difficult to find a seat because the pews are full of young people from 7PM onwards, awaiting the celebration that will begin only ten minutes after. They sit in silence, preparing for the Mass. Then the music begins, the incense rises towards the heights, and we find ourselves immersed in a liturgy that is well-curated, solemn and natural at the same time.
A Sunday does not pass in which I do not meet someone who is there for the first time.
One of the most interesting thing happens at the moment of communion: in the midst of the young people who receive the Eucharist with seriousness, there are others who present themselves before the priest with their arms crossed across their chest, which is how they indicate to the priest that they cannot yet receive the sacrament but that they desire to receive a blessing. Some come by themselves, driven by a personal urgency; others are invited with simplicity by friends, classmates, colleagues. It is a true novelty: the French state has done an immense work to ensure that people do not speak about religion outside of an intimate circle and often not even within it. And yet, a Sunday does not pass in which I do not meet someone who is there for the first time. It is not rare that someone will ask to be prepared for baptism or for First Communion. This year, there will be nine who are baptized, while there are 25 others who are already enrolled for the next year. But every month, someone new arrives. Meanwhile, about twenty young people are preparing for communion; for the most part, they were baptized as children but then never educated to the fatih. Another twenty or so are preparing for Confirmation. At the beginning, they struggle to name the desire they feel but there is no other thirst that could push these kids if not the life that is found only in God.
In 2023, we accompanied Romain to Baptism, and then to Confirmation in 2024. Some months after, he left on mission to the Christians of Armenia, leaving behind his work, his friends and a worried mother. From there, he wrote to me: “I am living many things here. Or rather, it would be better to say that I am living, period. My prayers to feel like I am truly living have been heard.”
