At the beginning of May, a group of sixty-four members of Assumption Together from the provinces of France, Spain and Europe embarked on a three-day pilgrimage to Paris, Preisch, and Metz, on the steps of St Marie Eugénie.

Adelle, one of the young participants from the English territory of the province of Europe tells us about her experience: ” Spending four days on the Paris and Lorraine pilgrimage was balm to my soul! I arrived a little flustered, however, with every fumbling French conversation my spirits  were restored and I was brought  into a deeper understanding of the richness of the Body of Christ and His real presence within and among us.”

The group included people from six different European Countries, with no single common language “I love being in situations where there is a language barrier”, Adelle shares ” as I find when we remove mere words, we begin to communicate in a truly deeper way. Words which have become over used, and often lose any real substances, give way to real authentic communication. It sharpens our other senses, and allows us to perceive one another in a different way, the crinkle of an eye, the slightest upturning of a mouth; we read each other in a new way. Again this really highlighted for me the unity within the Church, that we all forever will be bound together by the universal language, that is love; that is God himself in our midst.”

The group met in the mother house in Auteuil and visited Marie Eugénie childhood home in Preisch, and significant places in Metz, like the cathedral, and the church of St Ségolène, where Marie Eugenie received her first communion. The journey ended back in Paris, with a visit to the other significant places (St Sulpice and Rue Férou) and a final mass in Notre Dame. “[It was a] true privilege to share Eucharists, prayers, and songs in different languages, truly experiencing the meaning of the word together“, says Pepa Hernández, from Spain.