Pilgrimage to Chartres by David Joyce / Wikimedia Commons
CV NEWS FEED // The Vatican could consider “banning certain celebrations” of the Latin Mass at the 2025 Chartres pilgrimage, an annual event on Pentecost weekend for those dedicated to the Tridentine Mass, the newspaper of France’s bishops reports.
“According to consistent information in Paris and Rome, the Dicastery for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments believes that this annual gathering raises questions of compliance with the rules in force on the Mass in the ancient rite,” La Croix reports. “And would indeed consider banning certain celebrations.”
The newspaper said that the 2025 event, which the Notre-Dame de Chrétienté association will hold from June 7 to 9, should again attract thousands of pilgrims to Chartres Cathedral. The outlet also reported that British Cardinal Arthur Roche, the Dicastery’s prefect, “believes that the organizers of the event are not respecting the norms.”
This year, the 60-mile Chartres pilgrimage garnered record numbers of attendees, with between 18,000-20,000 pilgrims, according to the Catholic Herald UK. The pilgrimage also has a notably young demographic. The average age of the pilgrims is 23.
The event attracted high-profile conservatives like news commentator Candace Owens. French politician Marion Maréchal and the duke of Anjou, Louis de Bourbon, were also present, according to the European Conservative.
“But the question remains: when the spirit of the age is so set against everything this pilgrimage stands for, why is it so popular?” Paul Sapper wrote for the Catholic Herald. “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.”
He wrote that in an age that offers young people despair, the pilgrimage offers young people joy.
“It does this by presenting the authentic tradition of the Catholic Church – and the Traditional Latin Mass is a crucial part of that,” he said.
One British pilgrim, a 22-year-old named Grace Miller who attended with her fiancé, told Sapper why the annual event is important.
“I think the Chartres pilgrimage attracts such great numbers of young people because it exemplifies the world they long for,” she said. “Not necessarily a retreat to the past but a living community of joy and sacrifice and truth and charity.”
