What really happened at St. Rita's Fifteenth

The operation had been prepared in the greatest secrecy. She had to flow smoothly in the humidity of a summer without relief. We have been aware of what the Police Department prepared against the Church of St. Rita a few hours earlier. We knew that the CRS have the last word, the state does not have anything to what Max Weber called the monopoly of legal violence. But we do not want the closure of St. Rita to its destruction by the Promoter Lamotte, a purely administrative act. This spiritual center was to receive the honor due to him, at least on our part. A few phone calls later, in Paris emptied of its inhabitants, the team consisted resistant. Surprise: D-Day, we were a hundred, counting those who had spent the night in the church. We were ready to raise a spiritual protest worthy of the spirit of place against the administrative closure of the Santa Rita church. Yes Mass.

What is the spirit of the place?

St. Rita was built in the early twentieth century - in a style that blends harmoniously with the first concrete neo-Gothic - by an Anglican home community. These faithful were quickly called themselves the Apostolic Catholic. Their role ? Disseminate crucial message for all Christians: the end of the world is near. It was in the early nineteenth century ... Today, this group is reduced to the elderly and very few people. The Church of St. Rita was leased for twenty years Gallicans unrelated Bossuet, which can be defined as dissident Catholics. They gave St. Rita a true spiritual influence, through the blessings of animals and the holy prayer Rita, patron saint of desperate causes not only but of peace in families. When Bishop Philippe leaves the building of his own, it creates a void. The community is dormant.

It is in this situation that one of the managers asked me to come celebrate Mass for them. How not to receive the call for help? In late November 2015, I propose to raise a protest against the designs of the Promoter Lamotte, celebrating Mass every Sunday at 16 H (the only free slot in my day, a Mass schedule incongruous). But soon the church is full. I added a Mass at 11 H: it was full during the month of June. I was ready to add yet ... The churches of Paris - it must be said - are all full (especially in the fifteenth), and there is no competition but an offer still insufficient.


It is in this context that picture went around the world, that of the Abbe Billot, priest of the St. Paul Center for several years, mistreated by the police dragged him to the ground while it is still sacerdotal ornament. Warning ! There was no scandal or profanation of the sacred species, just a mass, mine, "finished Gas" ... if you feel what I mean, and then the police a little hasty with Minister Jesus Christ.

St. Rita asks only to live! It seems that the last word in this matter should not be left to police violence, or to profitability calculations. It is important that the opposing parties sit around a table (for example under the auspices of the Mayor of the XV) to decide what we will do in this church? A parking ? Social housing? Or - it has always been - a House of the Holy Spirit, where everyone can find this God who lets look, especially in the splendor of traditional liturgies?