A surprise surge of adult baptisms in France, despite the Catholic Church’s decline

The scene is engraved in Gaëlle Fasciaux’s memory: Her arms crossed, she sat down in the large basin set up in the middle of the Saint-Léger church in Lens, northern France. Then she fell backward and let herself be submerged. Yet no one could have predicted that the 37-year-old nursery assistant from Sallaumines would be baptized by immersion at Easter. “Religion was a long way off for me,” she said. The mother of two had grown up in an atheist family.

It was her son who first became interested in the Catholic religion when he was around 10 years old and wanted to go to mass. Then Fasciaux felt “her own faith growing,” began to pray “without realizing it” when things weren’t going well, and ended up entering the catechumenate – a two-year training program offered by the Church to adults, called “catechumens,” to prepare them to receive the sacraments of entry into the Christian life, including baptism. Affectionately nicknamed “Sister Gaëlle” by her friends and family, who were surprised to see her take the plunge into Christianity, she was baptized along with her two children, now aged 17 and 15. Since then, Sunday mass has become a family ritual.

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