Roger Monk writes:
INEVITABLY, in so independent-minded, not to say cynical, a country as France, the announcement that l’abbé Pierre, who so consistently attacked successive French governments, would be given a full state funeral at Notre-Dame has been greeted with a great deal of scepticism.
Yet, if the sincerity of some official grief might be questioned, then nobody listening to the many spontaneous broadcast tributes could doubt the heartfelt emotion provoked by the passing of the priest, who died on 21 January, aged 94.
Furthermore, if it could hardly be expected that the Church would heap praise on so vociferous a critic, who defended such heretical ideas as the use of birth control, the ordination of women, the marriage of priests, and even the freedom of homosexual couples to bring up children, then the doctrinal difficulty did not prevent the Primate of the French Catholic Church asking himself, on Europe 1, whether, since the death of St Francis of Assisi, any humble man of God had inspired a warmer or more spontaneous sympathy and affection in the hearts of his contemporaries.
Not that the much-loved champion of the poor, whose characteristic beard, glasses, beret, and walking stick had become as instantly recognisable in France as Chaplin’s moustache, cane, and bowler, was exempt from the sin of pride, or indeed from any other worldly failing. But his total honesty in confessing his faults made him all the more loved by a nation that repeatedly voted him its favourite public figure
Born in his parents’ mansion south of Lyon, Henri Grouès had grown up in a wealthy family of silk merchants, before renouncing his heritage and taking holy orders.
After playing an active part in the resistance to the Nazi occupation, when he adopted the code name “abbé Pierre”, he entered politics and served from 1945 to 1951 as a deputy for the Meurthe et Moselle Department. Preoccupied by the plight of the post-war homeless, he founded in 1949, at Neuilly Plaisance in the Paris suburbs, his famous Emmaus Chiffoniers, or rag pickers, who continue to collect clothing and other items for the benefit of the needy.
In the bitterly cold winter of 1954, having lost faith in mainstream politics, and having resigned from his MRP party over its support of colonialist intervention in Indo-China, l’abbé Pierre provoked one of the most memorable media events of the mid-20th century by his appeal on Radio Luxembourg on behalf of the homeless who, quite literally, were dying in the streets.
L’abbé Pierre’s lifelong campaign for the destitute earned him a major humanitarian award in 1991 (Humanité, paix et fraternité entre les peuples) and his work inspired many others, including the popular stand-up comic and actor, Coluche, who, before his premature death in 1986, set up his chain of “Restes du Coeur”, or “solidarity restaurants”, for rough sleepers and the homeless.
L’abbé Pierre knew very well that his fight was endless and thankless (as the present, continuing, demonstrations in France, in which many have been camping out on the streets, alongside the homeless, clearly remind us) — but kept to the last his unfailing courage and combative spirit. Nor did he ever bridle his tongue; for his most recent book, Mon Dieu, pourquoi?, was as provocative and controversial as ever.
Yet l’abbé Pierre’s confessed failure to live up to his own exacting standards — as, for example, in the matter of his great love of women, which frequently led him to break his vows of chastity — never led him to despair. On the contrary, he spoke without any fear of his impending death, which he expressed as the prospect of “meeting a friend” and of moving from “the shadows into the light”.
There seems little doubt that the memory of the turbulent but unsuppressed priest, with his great charisma and his unfailing courage and humour, will live on for many years to come.