Calls for "street prayers", "health measures not properly followed" ... The Paris police headquarters, which deplores in a press release published this Saturday the turn taken by a religious rally which was held on Friday in front of the Saint Church -Sulpice, in the 6th arrondissement of the capital, announced that it was banning "a demonstration of the same type organized on Sunday on the same Place Saint-Sulpice".
Friday evening, in the square of the religious building, Catholic faithful took part in a street prayer and asked for the possibility of organizing masses during confinement.
The latter are currently banned due to health regulations taken in the face of the coronavirus epidemic.
Thus, several dozen people settled in front of the church, carrying in particular banners inscribed with the slogan "Rendez-vous la mass".
"These health measures were not properly followed"
In its press release, the police headquarters said that "the organizers of the demonstration last Friday announced that they would join" the rally on Sunday.
However, the event of the day before did not respect the rules envisaged.
Parvis of the Saint-Sulpice church on Friday: Catholics gathered to protest against the closure of masses and churches / LP / Jean-Baptiste Quentin
"Despite the commitment of the organizers to enforce social distancing and barrier gestures, the police found that these health measures were not properly followed", deplores the text, insisting that " if the freedom to demonstrate is preserved ”during this pandemic,“ it must take place under acceptable sanitary conditions ”.
State services add that despite the ban on praying in the street, "these have been noted and relayed in particular on social networks".
This gave the declared event a twist of “a religious event prohibited on the public highway”.
A meeting of representatives of religions on Monday
Such events, bringing together many believers calling for the return of masses, have recently been observed in Versailles and Nantes and around thirty others are planned for Sunday (notably in Lyon, Bordeaux, Vannes, Nice, Tours, Poitiers or Strasbourg).
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“I don't want to send the police and the gendarmes to verbalize believers in front of a church, obviously.
But if it is a repeated act and which is manifestly contrary to the laws of the Republic, I will do it ", threatened Friday on France Info the Minister of the Interior, Gerald Darmanin, while recalling that" the freedom of worship is very important ”.
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He also proposed an alternative to masses: “Places of worship can continue to worship with a minister who can continue to do his office and film his office so that during the few weeks that we know of state of confinement, one can have a link with his religion ”.
Practice of worship during confinement.
My message to believers ⤵️ pic.twitter.com/ajT4kpMSaV
- Gérald DARMANIN (@GDarmanin) November 13, 2020
Then, in a message broadcast in the evening on Twitter, the tenant of Place Beauvau added that "places of worship remain open to allow individual meditation, while respecting barrier gestures".
Monday, it must bring together "for the second time the representatives of the main religions", in particular with the intention of discussing the resumption of the ceremonies "according to the health evolution".