Why young people love the Chartres pilgrimage

Paul Sapper • May 28, 2024

Why did a record number of people go on this year’s Paris to Chartres pilgrimage? And why were so many of the estimated 18,000 – 20,000 pilgrims who made the journey so young?

The pilgrimage is devoted to the Traditional Latin Mass and over Pentecost weekend and Whit Monday each year – 18-20 May this year – pilgrims walk around 60 miles from Paris to the Cathedral of Our Lady of Chartres.

We live in an age where church attendance across the Western world is declining. And yet, 2023’s record number of 16,000 pilgrims, whose average age was just over 20 years old, was broken by the even higher attendance this year.

The average age of attendees this year was 23, and 50 per cent were under 20 years old, according to the French association Notre-Dame de Chrétienté – which means Our Lady of Christendom – that organises the pilgrimage.

The pilgrimage’s size, youth and the presence of high-profile attendees there, such as US media personality Candace Owens, who recently converted to Catholicism in London’s Brompton Oratory, means it is starting to break beyond Catholic consciousness and into the mainstream.

But the question remains: when the spirit of the age is so set against everything this pilgrimage stands for, why is it so popular?

As a 26-year-old Catholic man, I attended the pilgrimage precisely for this reason – it offers everything the world is lacking and badly needs.

Everyone understands the world is becoming a darker place, and the young feel this in a particularly acute way.

Photo: Church of Saint-Sulpice, Paris, where pilgrims attended Mass on Saturday morning before starting the pilgrimage. (Photo courtesy author.)

The modern world, formed by Enlightenment thought, erroneously teaches that freedom and the good life come from living without constraint. It says marriage, tradition, custom, community and religion are all constraints that can be discarded at will by the autonomous individual.

In truth, constraint is necessary for human flourishing, as the classical and Christian traditions have always taught. The world is now pridefully teaching that all the things necessary for flourishing – including even the concept of truth – are oppressive constraints, and the result is that it now offers nothing but despair.

In contrast, the Chartres pilgrimage offers joy.

It does this by presenting the authentic tradition of the Catholic Church – and the Traditional Latin Mass is a crucial part of that.

British pilgrims Michele Vetrano, 23, and Grace Miller, 22, are engaged to be married in July, and they attended the pilgrimage for the second time this year.

“Young people are attracted to tradition because finding an objective answer in the modern era seems impossible,” Vetrano says. “The tradition of the Church offers young people the answers to all their questions and qualms, it offers them surety through a ‘tried-and-tested’ method.”

At Chartres, pilgrims are invited to gratefully and humbly accept that which has been passed down by countless saints through the centuries, whose sole concern was to worship God in the most reverent way possible.

To reject that tradition wholesale is to raise one’s own will above that which has been passed down –and to imitate the spirit of the age. But young people are fleeing the spirit of the age since they understand how empty it is, and which is why they instead are embracing tradition.

It is undoubtedly the case that there are many reverent and traditional Novus Ordo Masses. But it appears that for many Catholics the most humble and complete way of accepting the Latin Church’s and the West’s tradition is through the Traditional Latin Mass.

“I think the Chartres pilgrimage attracts such great numbers of young people because it exemplifies the world they long for,” Miller says. “Not necessarily a retreat to the past but a living community of joy and sacrifice and truth and charity.”

Video of Chartres pilgrimage in action, courtesy author.

The physically arduous nature of the pilgrimage is also something that is found appealing – another countercultural fact, since the world teaches that discomfort should be avoided at all costs.

“In between the prayers, chatting and singing, there are times when I’m walking, in the rain or blazing sun, aching and blistered, when I feel it is just me and my God and each step is a sacrifice on an earthly pilgrimage, strengthening me for my greater pilgrimage, and I think that this is what the Chartres pilgrimage represents for many others too,” Miller says.

The Chartres Pilgrimage has a long history. It was popular during the Middle Ages, but around the time of the French Revolution, it was in decline. The pilgrimage had a revival in the 19th century, only to fall into decline again following the Second Vatical Council.

In the 1980s it experienced another renewal, and this year was the 42nd annual pilgrimage since then.

Last year’s pilgrimage attendance of 16,000 was an increase of 33 per cent from 2022’s number of 12,000 pilgrims. This year, places on the pilgrimage sold out, as they did last year.

Helen Parry is one of the UK organisers of the pilgrimage – this was her 15th year attending – she commented on the increased interest in the pilgrimage: “We have seen a massive increase in demand for the pilgrimage in recent years, what with Covid-19 and the recent motu proprio Traditionis Custodes, both factors seem to have fuelled attendances even further, with this year reaching record breaking numbers, resulting in us having to close registrations a month before the pilgrimage.”

A priest pilgrim said the large number of young attendees was “uplifting and encouraging”, adding: “We hear a lot about the falling away of young people from the practice of their faith and dearth of vocations, but the Chartres Pilgrimage proves that as far as traditional Catholics are concerned, they are bucking the trend.”

Christendom is one of three themes that Notre-Dame de Chrétienté presents as key to the pilgrimage, after “tradition” and “mission”. This emphasis on Christendom also provides hope. For while many different flags are flown during the pilgrimage, with different languages spoken, there is a unity in faith and worship, and a feeling of brotherhood between the national chapters participating, and which Europe has not had in centuries.

The pilgrimage provides a beautiful glimpse at what Europe once looked like, and holds out hope that it, and the whole world, could one day have that same unity.

The priest pilgrim stressed to me the importance of the theme of “mission”. He said: “One cannot be a faithful Catholic if you are not missionary in outlook and practice.”

Traditional Catholics are sometimes criticised for not being evangelistic or outward looking enough. The priests’ words and the pilgrimage’s focus on the importance of mission show an emphasis that must be imitated by all traditional Catholics.

Catholicism is not an exclusive club – the term Catholic comes from the Greek word “universal” – the Church is for everyone because Christ died for everyone. It is the duty of every Catholic to make that case in the world. As Christ said: “Go into all the world and preach the gospel to the whole creation.”

With the public attention it is generating, the growth and undeniable beauty of the Chartres pilgrimage provides a unique opportunity to put into practise Christ’s words.

Pilgrims stretched out along a track during the Chartres pilgrimage; image courtesy author.

Union Jack flag being carried during the pilgrimage to Chartres; image courtesy author.