More than 100 Muslims were among the 2,000 faithful who packed the 11th-century Gothic cathedral of Rouen, near the Normandy town where two jihadi teenagers slit the throat of 85-year-old Father Jacques Hamel.
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“I’m very pleased that we invited Muslims”.
French television broadcast scenes of interfaith solidarity from all around France, with Muslim women in headscarves and Jewish men in kippot crowding the front rows of Catholic cathedrals in Lille, Calais or the Basilica of Saint Denis, the traditional resting place of French royalty. They were joined in the congregation by one of the nuns who was taken hostage during the atrocity last week.
“Outside the church, a group of Muslims were applauded when they unfurled a banner: ‘Love for all”.
Apparently thrilled by their presence, Churchgoer Jacqueline Prevot said that the attendance of Muslims was “a magnificent gesture”.
At the Saint Leger church in the northern city of Lens, around 30 Muslims attended mass wearing T-shirts emblazoned with messages such as, “Terrorism has no religion or identity”. “I say to myself that this assassination won’t be lost, that it will maybe relaunch us better than politics can do; maybe we will react in a better way”.
Apart from this Mass, there were other similar gatherings in France and its neighboring country Italy.
The rector of the Great Mosque of Paris, Dalil Boubakeur, who is also the president of the French Council of the Muslim Faith, attended a morning service in Notre-Dame cathedral in central Paris on Sunday.
The wire service reports that Paris and Bordeaux also saw Muslims attending mass. The BBC reports that Muslim leaders attended mass in Italy, where “three imams sat in the front row at Santa Maria Trastevere church in Rome. I am sure that there are those among the faithful who are ready to speak up”.
Ahmed El Balazi, the imam of the Vobarno mosque in the Lombard province of Brescia, said he did not fear repercussions for speaking out.
“I am not afraid….” “Religion is one thing”.
Many of those who attended were Ahmadi Muslims, a sect who believe there was a further prophet after Mohammed. The Foreign Minister of Italy, Paolo Gentiloni thanked the Muslims for their participation.
Recalling the unfortunate and gruesome death of the French priest, Father Jacques Hamel was assassinated by 19-year-old attackers Adel Kermiche and Abdel Malik Petitjean as he conducted Mass at a church in France. “Some of them were very poignant”, she said.
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The office added that a Syrian refugee detained after the attack was released Saturday. There was no suggestion that Islamic extremism played any part in the slayings.
