Father Olivier Marie's funeral took place on Friday in the Saint Louis-Marie Grignion basilica in Montfort, in Saint-Laurent-sur-Sèvre, in Vendée.
Nearly 600 people paid tribute to the murdered cleric, including the Minister of Justice, Eric Dupond-Moretti and Senator LR Bruno Retailleau.
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"A discreet man", of "proximity" and of a "great kindness": a little more than six hundred people gathered in Saint-Laurent-sur-Sèvre, in Vendée, on Friday on the occasion of the funeral of the father Olivier Maire, including the Keeper of the Seals, Eric Dupond-Moretti. "Olivier will be sadly missed by all of us. But true to his spirit, we will not judge and we will be inspired by him to overcome this ordeal," said one of his relatives, moved, in the cathedral. The funeral procession of around thirty people crossed the rue Jean-Paul II in emotion and meditation before reaching the entrance to the Saint Louis-Marie Grignion de Montfort basilica where Father Olivier Maire officiated and where the ceremony was celebrated.The Minister of Justice took his place in the first row a few meters from Bruno Retailleau, Senator Les Républicains Vendée.
"He was a man of proximity"
"We are gathered to commune with the Montfortian family in pain but also in hope," Father Etienne Richer told AFP on the sidelines of the ceremony.
The 60-year-old teacher at the Catholic Institute of Toulouse, who had known Father Olivier Maire for 20 years, remembers a man "hardworking, discreet, erudite and appreciated for that".
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"He was a man of proximity, he always called me by my first name", remembers Véronique Caillon-Penot, head of the Montfortian center of Pont-Château (Loire-Atlantique), the community to which Olivier Maire belonged and to which he was provincial superior.
Among the faithful gathered in front of the basilica were many representatives of the Montfortian community.
It is "a recognition for all he has done for us," said the sixty-year-old, interviewed by AFP.
A "martyr of charity"
The ceremony, which began at 2:30 p.m., was celebrated by Bishop Eric de Moulins-Beaufort, Archbishop of Reims and President of the Conference of Bishops of France, who deplored a "human mess" before the start of the ceremony.
"Last Monday, Father Olvier Maire died here as a martyr for charity," he proclaimed, blessing his coffin.
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The funeral lasted two hours, after which the members of the Montfortian community were the first to leave the basilica to accompany the funeral procession, alongside relatives and clergymen.
The remains of Olivier Maire then took the direction of the cemetery of the Congregation, a few hundred meters away to be buried there in the pure tradition of the Montfortians.
The alleged murderer hospitalized in psychiatry
Father Olivier Maire, 60, was killed on the night from Sunday to Monday in Saint-Laurent-sur-Sèvre, a village of 3,600 inhabitants. The alleged perpetrator, Emmanuel Abayisenga, a 40-year-old Rwandan, reported himself on Monday morning. He is also the alleged arsonist in July 2020 of Nantes cathedral, where he was a volunteer in the parish. He was housed in the community of Montfortians as part of his judicial control. Placed in police custody Monday morning, he was then hospitalized in psychiatry.