I was born in 1974. My parents were believers, non-practitioners. I was enrolled in catechism in the local parish according to Vatican 2. I spent months gluing petals to flower stems. I learned absolutely nothing. I made my communion, then my confirmation. During a Christmas mass, when I must have been 7 or 8 years old, the animator had the misfortune of making people sing: “don't look for God in the clouds”. Unfortunately, I had the faith of a child who sought God in the clouds. First disillusionment! Where was this God who was neither in catechism nor in the clouds?
My parents had a country house and we went to the village church at my request. An old priest officiated, in Latin. I discovered this mass to which I was immediately sensitive. My parents sold their second home and that was it.
Each year I moved a little further away from faith and practice. I did little or no catechism in middle school and barely more in high school.
I did scouting with the Guides of France while I was at university. I rediscovered the practice, that of camp masses. I found my first job in Lyon where I continued scouting. I went to scout mass once a week. I met a young priest who celebrates in French in front of the people. I rediscovered the beauty of the masses that I had experienced during my childhood.
A friend also attended traditional masses. I begged him to take me there. She refused, despite my insistence. Her argument was that if she took me away, I would never be able to return to a French mass in front of the people. I promised him it wouldn't happen to me. She gave in. During the first traditional mass, my soul caught its breath. I had finally found a place, a mass, a rite that suited me, without guitar, tambourine, applause, and movement of people throughout the mass.
Nothing but the silence of the soul which speaks to its God, the beauty of the rite, the respect offered to God. I told myself that this was my place.
Since then, I have been attending a chapel of the Sacerdotal Fraternity of Saint-Pierre. I feel good. One of my most beautiful memories is a low mass, on a Sunday evening, during which the priest said very gently in front of me, in magnificent silence: "corpus dominus nostri jesu christi custodiat anima tua ad vitam aeternam" (May your soul keep the body of our Lord Jesus Christ for eternal life). A delight!
