France

Pray for France

Flag & location

Map of France

Population of France

The religious scene in France

• The population of France is around 65 million, 20% living in the Paris area

• France is the nearest mission field to the UK • Roman Catholicism : only about 14% regularly attend Mass • There are over 5 million Muslims. The same percentage of practise as

in Catholicism • 1.5 million claim to be Protestants (with 600 000 practising) • Around 3 million (often disenchanted Catholics) are involved in New

Age spiritualities and a growing number of under 30s are agnostic. There is a new current of radical atheism.

Public life in France is ruled by the republican idea of liberty, equality and fraternity. This means neutrality with regard to religion, which is absent from politics and education. Laws exist regulating religious practice and minority groups only tend to run into difficulties with the authorities when they act outside the law.

A mission field

• France is a mission field. Even if the Roman church tries to keep up appearances and can mobilise large numbers, France is a highly secularised country. Religious practise is low particularly in the cities.

Evangelical believers in France

• Evangelicals are growing. At present there are 460 000 evangelicals and over 40 denominations.

• Since 1970, 1 500 new evangelical churches have been created. This encouraging growth is partly a result of immigration

• In 2007 evangelical churches established the National Council of French Evangelicals (CNEF)

Points for prayer

• Pray for the growing church planting movement• Pray for deepening of biblical faith to accompany recent growth• Pray for a renewal in preaching, biblical teaching and evangelism• Pray that the temptations of neo-evangelicalism, ecumenism and

compromise with liberal protestantism will be resisted• Pray for the training of candidates for the ministry (Seminaries at Aix-

en-Provence and Vaux-sur-Seine near Paris and the Bible colleges at Nogent and Geneva)

• Pray for the work of the National Council of French Evangelicals