For secular and Catholic France, a shock to the system: the rise of the evangelicals

November 6, 2009

The Guardian by Lizzy Davies

As the piano strikes up, the congregation sways, palms to the ceiling, fists in the air, murmurs of hallelujah punctuating the music. Pastor Franck Lefillatre, besuited and bathed in the spotlight on his podium, intones into a microphone.

"Let out the words that are in your heart," he urges. His whispers crescendo to booming rhetoric. Behind him, emblazoned in gold lettering, are the words: "Jesus Christ: the same yesterday, today, eternally."

As evangelical services go, this gathering on a rainy Sunday afternoon is nothing unusual. In countless churches around the United States and many other countries it would be a staple means of Christian worship.

But this is not the American Bible belt. It is the Church of Paris-Bastille, and this congregation is just one of a growing number of evangelical communities spreading through France and prospering in spite of its staunchly secular – and Catholic – traditions. Read the complete story