Tallinn, Estonia, Jun 15, 2021 / 17:01 pm
The only bishop in Estonia is making history.
Bishop Philippe Jourdan leads the Catholic Church in Estonia, which is considered the least religious country in Europe. Nestled between Russia and Latvia, the small country boasts a population of just over 1 million. Of that, an estimated 6,000 citizens – roughly 0.6% of the population – identify as Catholic.
That’s because religion almost disappeared from Estonia while under Soviet rule in the 1940s. Still, Catholic leaders are anticipating change for Estonia – change sparked by Pope Francis’ visit to the country in 2018. Bishop Jourdan, the apostolic administrator of Estonia, emphasized the importance of the papal visit.
Pope Francis has a “special talent to touch the heart also of people who are very far away,” he told EWTN News In Depth on June 11.
“For many people – for the average Estonian – now let’s say that the Catholic Church, especially the pope, is something nearer,” he said.
Bishop Jourdan is a part of the country’s change and hope for the Church in Estonia. Born in Dax, France, he expressed interest in both science and the faith growing up. That led him to study civil engineering as a college student. Faith and science, he said, complement one another.
“I was never afraid to confront science with the light of faith or faith with the light of science,” he said. “Science now strengthens, really, our faith because it helps us to discover, to be more amazed in front of the reality.”
But even as he studied science, he encountered a “feeling of having a vocation, a supernatural vocation” and the “internal conviction that God is asking something else from me.”
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