What’s everyone talking about this week: For the first time in five centuries, Catholic worshippers in England and Wales may soon outnumber Protestants

Spotify recently curated a playlist for me under the title ‘Ethereal’. Its subtitle, ‘modern heavenly sounds’, seems to indicate I’m overdue repentance and would probably find it helpful if I listened to Max Richter. Really, it’s Spotify that ought to apologise: its annual report of my personal listening habits, published earlier this month, declared I had the ear of a 21 year old. Oh, sorry: was that meant to be flattering?

Perhaps Spotify has also come across the headlines about Britain’s churchgoing youth. In 2018, only 4% of 18–24 year olds attended Church at least once a month, but that figure now stands at 16%. Those who came of age during the pandemic are now entering a particularly precarious job market: no wonder they yearn for a little stability, a little community, a little joy.

As Christmas Eve turns to Christmas morning, millions of 20-somethings are expected to crowd into Midnight Mass. Author Lamorna Ash, who documented the recent rush to faith in her 2025 book, Don’t Forget We’re Here Forever, believes the search for ‘more life’ — as critic Harold Bloom once described the ethos of religion — might be best achieved ‘not just by accepting what we’ve been taught by [our] elders, but by looking more deeply into the origins, contexts and source literature of the religions that may be part of our inheritance.'

The operative term here is ‘elders’; young people’s parents, aged 40–60, are statistically more likely to be atheist. Writing in The Times, James Marriott described the young’s return to Church as ‘a backlash against secularism’. Diptyque, by this logic, would do well to create an incense-flavoured candle under the name ‘Smells like teen spirit’.

Indeed, more than the promise of eternal life, it’s the ‘bells and smells’ that have captivated younger congregants. ‘The newly pious aren’t flocking to the Church of England,’ reported The Economist, but ‘showing up at Catholic Mass’, where pomp and ceremony are on full show. ‘For the first time in five centuries,’ the magazine claims, ‘Catholic worshippers in England and Wales may soon outnumber Protestants.’ Young men, specifically, are the fastest growing demographic — evidence, to some, of a society in which they feel abandoned and of the power held over them by conservative influencers, who see in the Church a solution to woke overreach.

As I prepare myself for Midnight Mass, I feel something quite different. To me, the pull of Christianity has more to do with providing a structure for the spiritual; better that than falling down an astrology rabbit hole on social media. Headphones on, I guess: into ‘modern heavenly sounds’ we dive.