France: Are the terrorist attacks bringing French people back to Church?

According to La Croix on January 20, 2016, "ever since the terrorist attacks in France, the churches have been fuller." Without giving any numbers, the French newspaper described "anonymous persons" who come "in reverence and silence" to "seek for their roots" or "find a refuge". They slip in "behind the church pillars, silent and deserted during the day." Remaining off to the side during the offices, "they light a candle, pray discreetly and disappear."

Fr. Bernard Brien, a priest in Perreux (Val-de-Marne), described in this same article a church that was full "the two Sundays after the attack at the Bataclan, as well as on Christmas. Since then, it has not been the same crowd, but I still see new heads."

Fr. Jean-Hubert Thieffry, pastor at Sophia-Antipolis (Alpes-Maritimes), also noticed "a new questioning of what is fundamental, persons who feel more strongly the vulnerability of life, who wonder at acts supposedly committed in the name of God." A retired couple from Tours that have started going to church regularly say they "felt the need to receive communion with the others," and admit that the Gospel "reassures" them and helps them "shake off the torpor" of the television news.

The reasons for this sudden return to the church are "clearly a question of identity" for some, judges Fr. Geoffroy de la Tousche, pastor in Dieppe (Seine-Maritime), who seems to deplore the fact that "for one family, for example, their return is visibly associated with an anti-Muslim reflex." Others express a need to reconnect with their roots, or even "defend our Judeo-Christian values." The newspaper quotes a 49-year-old duck-raiser in Dordogne, father of four, who claims to be "revolted by the poor response of our politicians, who wish to demolish our Judeo-Christian culture in favor of a secularism that gives our children no references and leads us straight into a wall! I have nothing against respect for other religions, but why reject what is at the root of our culture and our families?"

(sources: apic/lacroix – DICI no.330 Feb. 12, 2016)