I’m an Atheist—but Going to Mass at the Sagrada Família Changed My Life Forever

From its inception, the Barcelona trip I took in March 2025 felt antithetical to who I am as a person (that is, type A). My friends and I booked everything the week of, dropping a few hundred euros on an Airbnb and budget plane tickets from Paris, where we were living at the time. Other than those essentials, we planned nothing for our weekend, eschewing my usual detailed itineraries for some level of slightly uncomfortable spontaneity. At this point, it was much too late to book tickets to any of the top attractions; Parc Güell, the Picasso Museum, and Sagrada Família were all sold out. All the same, we decided to wing it.

The Friday morning of our trip, I sacrificed six of my precious eight hours of sleep to take a 3 a.m. Uber to Paris Orly Airport. By 10 a.m., my two friends and I were in the heart of Barcelona, where we’d be for the next 50 hours.

The first day was long, hot, and exhausting. Running on about two hours of sleep with our huge, mildly dorky backpacks in tow, we hiked up Montjuïc hill; spent a few hours in the Joan Miró Foundation; and took a long, winding journey back down (albeit with spectacular views). When it was finally time to check in to our Airbnb, we struggled deeply with the janky lock, but the fight was ameliorated by a delicious meal of black paella at Restaurant Palermo. Afterward, I was more than ready to turn in for the night. My friends, however, were determined to see the Basílica de la Sagrada Família—so, outvoted, along I went.

Construction on Sagrada Família began almost a century and a half ago, in 1882. Catalan modernist architect Antoni Gaudí took over its design the next year, and from 1914 until he passed away, it was his only project. The church, easily distinguishable by Gaudí’s signature nature-inspired style, is still under construction—a project that has taken over 140 years to complete—but it’s set to be done in 2026, the centennial of his death. 

When I visited, Sagrada Família was missing its tallest central spire, the tower of Jesus Christ. And yet, it was still a formidable sight: a stone behemoth in ivory and beige, impossibly intricate, breathtakingly tall. Honestly, American churches had never interested me. But the Gothic, stately, exponentially older European church was a different beast—and Sagrada Família was in league of its own. That night, we spent an hour walking around the entirety of the church, breathing it in, letting the unanticipated cold seep past our inadequate layers. Despite our best efforts, pictures captured nothing. 

We began in front of the Passion façade, a skeletal, shadowy construction centered on the cross and, just under it, the crucifixion scene. Then, after walking around the unfinished Glory façade, we reached Nativity. 

This side of Sagrada Família was darker, rounder—as if stained and eroded with time. With rippling shapes and mosslike florals, it’s ornate, organic, and acutely Gaudían. We spent most of that hour in front of the Nativity façade: three upward-tilted chins, six unblinking eyes. 

As a lifelong atheist, I was mostly ignorant of the stories behind the biblical imagery on each of the church’s sides, yet their raw, historic power struck me all the same. The unfinished nature of Sagrada Família only added to its effect. After all, there I was, witnessing something great in the long process of being made. 

We knew we wanted to go inside. But the question was, how do we actually do that? Standard tickets were long gone and last-minute tours were far too pricey for our college student budgets. After a bit of digging, we found a possibility. 

Every Saturday at 8 p.m., Sagrada Família holds an international Mass. All are welcome, and it’s free. (There’s also Mass on Sunday mornings, but we had a plane to catch.) Frankly, I didn’t care much about the Mass aspect of it all. I just thought the outside was stunning and wanted to see the much-talked-about interior before leaving Barcelona. So, the next day, the three of us made our way to Mass. 

The plan wasn’t set in stone. That night after our exterior tour of the church, we had a  sangria-fueled late night out, naturally. Then on the day of, we took ourselves on an extensive walk through the Parc de la Ciutadella to Somorrostro Beach, where we sat for probably too long (entirely inappropriately dressed for the beach—I, for one, was in a black leather jacket and jeans, and none of us had brought sunscreen). Ultimately, we agreed that it would be okay if we did not have time for the Mass that night. But at the last minute, we decided to hop on the metro and try. In the end, we made it just in time and were among the last to be let inside. 

Before studying abroad in Europe, I had been in a church maybe two or three times in my life. My childhood best friend went to the local Methodist church, a nondescript, one-story white building on the road adjacent to my suburban Pennsylvania neighborhood. I had attended with her a couple of times, for some event or the other, and it hadn’t left much of an impression on me. Growing up, the closest I ever really got to spirituality was visiting temples and burning incense on trips to China, or perhaps sporadically trying to meditate at various points in high school. But when I walked into this church, for the first time, I began to feel like I understood what it meant, yet I wasn’t quite able to place a finger on what “it” was.

The interior was somehow more impressive than the façades. It spiraled upwards, with deceptively simple, tree-like columns and dizzyingly high ceilings. It felt like an enchanted forest of white stone, all warm lights and arches and rainbow-dappled glass, not a right angle to be found. I had the sense that the basilica was growing, and I with it. As we took it in from our folding seats, heads raised, lips parted, a hush fell over the crowd, and Mass began.

To be honest, half the time, I had little to no clue what was going on. Some parts were spoken in English and French, but many elements of the Mass were in other languages, too. Add on the fact that  I didn’t have much foundational knowledge of the story being told to begin with—which, as my friend later told me, was of the parable of the prodigal son. But it was enough to simply exist inside the church, in a space that extended so far above and around us and seemed to buzz with tangible energy.

Fifteen, 30, 45 minutes in, several groups of tourists got up and left. They, like us, probably just wanted to get inside for free—but we stayed glued the whole way through. We strained to hear speaking and singing in languages we couldn’t understand, turned to greet our stranger-neighbors from different countries, and stood to watch a Eucharist we couldn’t take part in. 

It wasn’t how I pictured spending my last night in Barcelona. It wasn’t something I’d pictured ever doing at all. I’ve always sought completeness, definitive knowledge, rigid structure. But that night, surrounded by a collective longing for faith and connection, I let it take me—the beauty of something unfinished, unanswered; the ever-unfolding realization of a centuries-old design.

An hour later, it was dark outside, but inside—where we’d spent our whole lives, it seemed—the shadows glowed amber. Under the canopy of living stone, Mass ended. And so we went forth.