Solène Tadié

Catholic Revival in Europe Fellow

Solène Tadié is a French-Swiss journalist and Distinguished Fellow at the Institute for Policy Research in Catholic Studies at The Catholic University of America. She has served as Europe Correspondent for EWTN News since 2019, reporting on religious, cultural, and political developments across the continent.

Raised in Paris, she spent several years in Rome, where she worked for the culture section of the Vatican daily newspaper L’Osservatore Romano. Her work focuses on European affairs, religious freedom, cultural life, and the role of Christianity in contemporary societies. From 2022 to 2026, based in Budapest and Rome, she reported on the religious and political landscape of Central Europe, exploring how different historical experiences shape contemporary debates on faith, national identity, and the future of Europe. She also regularly moderates international conferences and provides commentary on current affairs for US and European media outlets.

She holds degrees in journalism and publishing from Roma Tre University and in philosophy from the Pontifical University of Saint Thomas Aquinas in Rome.

Solène is currently working on The God-Thirsty: Inside the Unexpected Rebirth of Catholic Europe, forthcoming from Creed & Culture, and is the author of Le Royaume et le monde, a book-length conversation with Cardinal Péter Erdő, forthcoming from Éditions du Cerf in France.'

Fellowship description

The “Catholic Revival in Europe” fellowship examines emerging signs of Catholic renewal within secularized European societies. Drawing on Solène Tadié’s reporting and her related book project, the fellowship seeks to determine where this renewed interest in the Catholic faith and culture is manifesting itself, who is driving it, and what these developments may reveal about the continent’s future.

The research focuses in particular on the phenomenon of adult conversions and the mechanisms underlying them, the growing role of Gen Z in this resurgence, the intergenerational transmission of the faith, as well as the role of parishes, religious communities, lay movements, and cultural initiatives in sustaining and developing Catholic life. It covers both historically Catholic countries and societies where Catholics have existed as a small minority, exploring the nuances and similarities between these contexts.

Combining field reporting, interviews, and data from bishops' conferences and academics, the project seeks to understand local developments and broader trends. It explores the coexistence of this renewal with persisting institutional decline, and its potential implications for the future place of Christianity in the public sphere.

One of the central aims of this fellowship is to foster transatlantic dialogue. Through research, articles, public conversations and debates, it will bring European experiences into dialogue with American data, examining the shared challenges of secularization, the transmission of faith, and the civilizational shifts facing the West.

Primary line of research

Contemporary Catholic revival in Europe, with particular attention to adult conversion, Gen Z's thirst for transcendence, intergenerational transmission, the formation of religious communities, and the cultural and public implications of these developments in a transatlantic perspective.