Abbé Pierre will disappear from the streets of Terrebonne. After “analysis” of the file, the City decided to “officially” rename the street name associated with the famous French cleric, accused after his death of having abused several women.
Posted at 12:00 a.m.
“Sensitive to testimonies of sexual violence targeting Abbé Pierre”, the executive committee will mandate the toponymy committee to “unassign the name of the place so that rue de l’Abbé-Pierre in Terrebonne is renamed”, explains the City by email .
This Quebec decision joins dozens of others in France since the recent revelations concerning the Catholic priest, founder of the Emmaus movement and who died in 2007.
On July 17, the Emmaus Movement made public allegations of sexual assault or sexual harassment committed by Abbé Pierre between the end of the 1970s and 2005. The victims were employees, volunteers, or young women from his personal entourage. Since then, around twenty other women have accused the priest of sexual violence allegedly committed between the 1950s and 2000s, including against minors.
France, which had long glorified the religious in the beret and the black cape, because of his actions for the disadvantaged, has fallen from a height.
In the process, dozens of municipalities announced that they wanted to rename the names of streets, plaques, parks, squares, schools and other places of memory relating to Abbé Pierre, places which numbered 150 before the scandal broke.
Just this week, the City of Perpignan voted unanimously to rename an avenue after Abbé Pierre. The toponym of the priest has also disappeared from the cities of Lyon, Nîmes, Grande-Synthe, Saint-Étienne, Besançon, Talant, Nantes, and other smaller municipalities. A statue of the clergyman was also torn down in Norges-la-Ville, while the Abbé-Pierre Foundation was one of the first to announce that it would change its name.
More debaptisms in Quebec?
In Quebec, where the priest has come a few times, and where he is also suspected of sexual misconduct, according to revelations that occurred in September in the French media, there are also a handful of references to Abbé Pierre, his real name Henri Grouès. The City of Terrebonne is the first to follow the “debaptisms” movement initiated in France.
Will there be others?
In Quebec, where there is an Abbé-Pierre street (in Cap-Rouge), the City’s reflection is “still in progress”. According to a spokesperson, the priest’s case “is among those considered in the context of this reflection”, but it is emphasized that the “work is much broader than this single case”. The City specifies that it will communicate the results of this exercise in due course.
We can also wonder if Abbé Pierre will be removed from the National Order of Quebec, which had named him a “grand officer” in 1995.
Questioned on this subject, the Council of the Order told us that no decision has been taken to this effect. However, we say we are “following the evolution of the situation” and we say we are “aware of the seriousness of the accusations, although Abbé Pierre was not the subject of a judicial decision during his lifetime”.
According to the Council, procedures for revoking a title begin with “a judgment of guilt or undeniable proof that demonstrates unacceptable and incompatible behavior” from a person. It is on this basis that actor Gérard Depardieu was removed from the Order of Quebec in 2023, following the broadcast of a video testifying to his “offensive” behavior.
