Notre Dame De Chr Tient

More than 20,000 pilgrims walked from Paris to Chartres this Pentecost. Now the UK has launched its own version. Inspired by the famous Chartres pilgrimage, Our Lady of Christendom will lead pilgrims from Oxford to Evesham Abbey, the site of the first recorded apparition of Our Lady in England This year’s Pentecost weekend marked the 44th annual Notre-Dame de Chrétienté pilgrimage, where more than 20,000 pilgrims made the journey on foot from Paris to Chartres. With an average age of 22 and hundreds of priests and religious accompanying the pilgrims, Notre-Dame de Chrétienté has become associated with a revival of Catholic worship and devotion to the traditional liturgy of the Church. Although most pilgrims are French, the Notre-Dame de Chrétienté pilgrimage has attracted participants from abroad since its founding in 1982. Witnessing the energy and vitality the pilgrimage brings to those who take part, many have returned to their home countries seeking to establish similar routes. Now the UK has organised its own. Organised by the apostolate Our Lady of Christendom, the pilgrimage begins at St Gregory and St Augustine’s in Oxford, a parish renowned for its reverent celebration of the Traditional Latin Mass in a city where the ancient rite is already well represented. Pilgrims will then walk through the Cotswolds, camping for two nights before arriving at the ruins of Evesham Abbey on the third day. Evesham is the site of the earliest recorded Marian apparition in England, where, according to tradition, the Virgin Mary appeared to a pig keeper named Eof. The apparition led St Ecgwine, Bishop of Worcester, to found a monastery on the site, which grew into Evesham Abbey and became an important centre of Marian pilgrimage. During the Dissolution of the Monasteries in the 1530s, most of the abbey was destroyed, although the bell tower survives today. The origins of the pilgrimage can be traced to a one-day pilgrimage held last year from Tewkesbury Abbey, the of the UK’s second-oldest Marian apparition, to the ruins of Evesham Abbey. A Dominican Rite Sung Mass was offered at The Immaculate Conception and St Egwin’s Catholic Church in Evesham, and the pilgrimage carried relics of St Mary Margaret Alacoque and St Claude de la Colombière, linking participants spiritually with Chartres. Last year’s pilgrims pray before the relics of St Mary Margaret Alacoque and St Claude de la Colombière Organisers hope the pilgrimage will contribute to the restoration of the Kingdom of Christ in the UK and foster devotion to the Blessed Virgin Mary. The initiative comes at a time of growing interest in Catholicism across the UK. Westminster has recorded a 100 per cent increase in adult baptisms over the past two years, while the Oxford Oratory received more adults into the Church this February than during the whole of the previous year. By bringing together Catholics for three days of prayer, penance and pilgrimage, organisers hope to build on that renewed interest and encourage a deeper commitment to the faith. The pilgrimage’s president, Andrea Cabanas, attributes its existence to divine providence, telling AdVaticanum that it is “only through God’s Providence that ‘Our Lady of Christendom Pilgrimage’ exists today”. She said organisers have received support from “both Chartres and Covadonga pilgrimages”, as well as from their chaplain and local faithful who have donated and prayed for the pilgrimage’s success. She added that organisers have placed particular trust in the intercession of St Joseph, St John Henry Newman and Blessed Dominic Barberi. Cabanas is encouraging others to get involved, asking people to “support and volunteer with their God-given gifts in the restoration of the Kingdom of Christ here in Britain, especially those who live in this country and have been attending Chartres pilgrimage for many years”. Those wishing to attend this year’s pilgrimage have until 19 June to register via the pilgrimage website . Priests and religious are invited to attend free of charge, and priests will be able to celebrate their own private Masses during the pilgrimage.

France has seen a surge in adult baptisms. At the same time, more than 20,000 pilgrims completed the three-day pilgrimage to Chartres, the flagship event of the Traditional Latin Mass movement in France. This is the story behind its remarkable growth This year’s annual Notre-Dame de Chrétienté pilgrimage saw more than 20,000, mostly young people make their way from Paris to Chartres amid a Europe-wide heatwave. It is another record-breaking year for the event, which is supported by a further 6,000 volunteers. Like much that is found in the traditional wing of the Church, the pilgrimage is both old and new. New in the sense that it has a vitality brought about by its young attendees. Old in the sense that its origins are medieval. The city of Chartres owes its association with pilgrimage to the Sancta Camisa, a piece of silk worn by Our Lady during the Nativity. Depending on the account, Charlemagne either stole the relic in Constantinople, or was given it by the Byzantine imperial family, and then in turn gave it to his grandson Charles II, also known as Charles the Bald, who presented it to Chartres Cathedral in 876. The Sancta Camisa came to prominence in 911, when Chartres was subjected to a Viking raid. Gantelme, the bishop and military leader of Chartres, is reported to have displayed the relic above the town gate. This is said to have emboldened the defenders of Chartres and terrified the pagan army, resulting in the town withstanding the attack. The episode led to the conversion of Rollo, the Viking leader, his pledge of allegiance to Charles the Simple, more charitably known as Charles III, and the establishment of the Duchy of Normandy, with Rollo as its first duke. Just over a century and a half later, that duchy would successfully invade England, a feat no one has yet matched. Over the ensuing centuries, the cathedral was subjected to successive fires. After each one, however, the people of Chartres rebuilt it in ever more splendid forms. The “Cult of the Carts”, a medieval devotion in which lay people harnessed themselves to carts in place of oxen to transport building materials, finds one of its most famous examples in Chartres. In a letter written by Abbot Haymo of Saint-Pierre-sur-Dives to the monks of Tutbury Abbey in England, Haymo described people of all social classes dragging materials to Chartres catherdral as an act of piety and penance. During the late Middle Ages and the Renaissance, Chartres became a major centre of Christian pilgrimage. Great fairs were held for the Presentation, the Annunciation, the Assumption and the Nativity, with pilgrims arriving in time to join the festivities. The area surrounding the cathedral functioned as a free-trade zone, exempt from state taxation and governed instead by cathedral authorities. On 7 August 1773, the high altar designed by Charles-Antoine Bridan, depicting the Blessed Virgin Mary’s Assumption into Heaven, was consecrated. Today it remains one of the most iconic features of the medieval cathedral, alongside its celebrated stained-glass windows. More than a century later, another Charles became synonymous with the cathedral. Charles Péguy, the French poet and essayist, helped keep the pilgrimage to Chartres alive by establishing the Paris route. Péguy spent much of his early life detached from religion and would probably have identified more as a Dreyfusard than anything else. Yet his growing nationalism ultimately led him back to France’s Catholic heritage, perhaps most clearly expressed in Le Mystère de la charité de Jeanne d’Arc ( The Mystery of the Charity of Joan of Arc ), first published in 1910. In 1911, at the deathbed of his son Pierre, he made a promise that if his son recovered, he would make a pilgrimage to Chartres beginning in Paris. In 1912, he completed the journey, which left him transformed. He took his students on the pilgrimage and, when he was killed in battle in 1914, they continued the pilgrimage in his honour. Péguy’s faith was complicated. He was married to a divorcee and was never able to be sacramentally reconciled with the Church. However, his Catholicism by conviction bears considerable witness to the power of the Church to draw people in, no matter the obstacles in their path. Like many good traditions, Chartres fell out of use in the years of liturgical upheaval that followed the Second Vatican Council. The Paris to Chartres route, etched into Catholic intellectual France by Péguy, ceased to exist and it was not until 1982 that it resurfaced. It is now associated with the traditionalist movement within the Church. In 1988, after Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre was excommunicated following the illicit episcopal consecrations at Écône, a reality sadly familiar for this year’s pilgrimage, the Society of Saint Pius X began to walk the route in reverse, starting in Chartres and finishing in Paris, a journey it makes to this day. Organised by Notre-Dame de Chrétienté, the pilgrimage has grown at a staggering rate. In 2010, attendance reached 10,000. By 2023, organisers had to close registration early and limit attendance to 16,000, with this year’s numbers exceeding 20,000. This year’s journey started on Saturday 23 May, with Holy Mass at Saint-Sulpice, Paris’s second-largest church, where pilgrims gathered from 5 a.m., filling the surrounding streets. A military-style operation enabled pilgrims to drop off their tents and bags before being escorted through the Saturday morning streets of Paris. Priests process into Saint-Sulpice for the opening Mass of the pilgrimage Walking through the streets of Paris, pilgrims sang hymns while carrying banners displaying saints to whom they are devoted. More than 4,000 religious and priests accompanied the groups, with the short distances between chapters providing opportunities for confession. Pilgrims walk through the French countryside At the end of the first day, pilgrims camped at a vast campsite in Senlisse. Tents were erected for the night, with special areas for priests to celebrate individual Masses from 4 a.m. The following day, at 5.30 a.m., pilgrims were woken for what was potentially the most arduous day of the journey because of the heat and sun exposure, making their way to an open field en route for Pentecost Sunday Mass celebrated by Father Antonius Maria Mamsery, Superior General of the Missionaries of the Holy Cross, a community devoted to the Traditional Latin Mass. Speaking to AdVaticanum after Mass, Father Antonius described the pilgrimage as the “hope of Europe” and “the hope of the revival of the faith and of Catholicism as it once was”. After another evening in a specially erected campsite, the final leg of the journey was completed on Pentecost Monday, a national holiday in France. The crowds arrived singing “Chartres sonne, Chartres t’appelle” (“Chartres rings, Chartres calls you”), before a Solemn Pontifical High Mass celebrated by Cardinal Raymond Burke. His Eminence Cardinal Raymond Burke blesses pilgrims before celebrating a Solemn Pontifical High Mass at the conclusion of the Notre-Dame de Chrétienté pilgrimage in Chartres. Today the pilgrimage has an international character, with pilgrims travelling from as far afield as Australia and South America. However, it remains predominantly French. France is currently experiencing a revival in Catholic devotion, with more than 13,000 adult baptisms this year, a 270 per cent increase in just five years, with the largest cohort, 42 per cent, aged between 18 and 26. The combined number of adult and adolescent baptisms exceeds 20,000, roughly equivalent to the number of pilgrims who took part in this year’s pilgrimage. It is therefore no coincidence that this year’s pilgrimage theme is mission. Organisers said the event stands “at the heart of this spiritual awakening in France, for which prayers have been offered for 44 years”, and it was notable that passers-by were handed leaflets as the pilgrimage passed through towns and villages. The Bishop of Chartres, Bishop Philippe Christory, who gladly welcomes the throngs of pilgrims to his cathedral each year, acknowledged that although the increase in baptisms is significant, “so many are still so far away from the Church”. Speaking to AdVaticanum, he said: “We have to love. Love is the key, the door and the way. Otherwise, this is all nonsense, if it is not for love of God and love for our brothers.” A cynic might judge the turnout to be relatively small compared with the millions who gather for World Youth Day. But the pilgrimage exists without extensive promotion from the Church’s hierarchy, and it is a journey made entirely on foot. It is a pilgrimage of penance and mortification that requires a level of commitment and physical endurance beyond that of a typical pilgrimage. Perhaps a fairer comparison would be Rome’s annual marathon, which 22,000 people completed in 2025 in cooler weather and over less than half the distance. What is increasingly clear is that Chartres represents a phenomenon that it is now impossible for the Church hierarchy to ignore: a younger generation of Catholics is devoted to the Traditional Latin Mass in substantial numbers, and that this devotion will persevere through any restrictions imposed upon it. The first signs of this acknowledgement are becoming apparent, notably in Pope Leo’s request earlier this year that the French bishops show charity towards those attached to the traditional form of the Mass. Brother João, a member of the Fraternity of St Joseph the Guardian, a community that offers the Traditional Latin Mass in the Diocese of Fréjus-Toulon to re-evangelise France, put it succinctly when he told AdVaticanum: “Chartres is a testimony.” With a younger generation of clergy also rising through the Church’s hierarchical ranks who share the same devotion, it remains only a question of time before that testimony leads to concrete action and the promotion, rather than the penalisation, of the Church’s most ancient and edifying liturgical expression. Photo credit: Notre-Dame de Chrétienté