An organist at Strasbourg Cathedral was fired after being convicted of sexual harassment of one of his underage students.
Facts committed outside the framework of the Church, AFP learned Tuesday, October 18 from the archdiocese.
Read alsoThe five key figures of the Sauvé report on sexual abuse in the Catholic Church
This 58-year-old man, one of the three co-owners since 1995 of the great organ of the Strasbourg cathedral, was notified "
by mail
" of his dismissal by the archbishopric after his conviction on 11 October by the Strasbourg criminal court in six months suspended prison sentence, according to a spokesperson for the institution.
He had previously been the subject of a "
layoff
", he added.
Already condemned
The seasoned organist, who also gave concerts and lessons in local institutions, was convicted of sending several messages with a sexual connotation to one of his students when she was 13 to 15 years old. The court also decided to register him in the file of perpetrators of sexual offenses but left him the possibility of continuing to teach minors, according to Les Latest Nouvelles d'Alsace (DNA).
According to a source familiar with the matter, he had already been sentenced in 1999 to a 15-month suspended prison sentence for sexual assault on a minor. In 2019, a complaint was also filed against him in Mulhouse (Haut-Rhin) by another woman for allegations of touching suffered when she was a minor, according to the same source, confirming information from DNA. The alleged victim had been received by the Archbishop of Strasbourg, Mgr Luc Ravel, according to the regional daily.
Made public in early October, the Sauvé report on child crime within the Catholic Church estimates that 216,000 minors have been victims of priests, deacons and religious since 1950. A number which climbs to 330,000 if we add the people assaulted by lay people working in Church institutions (teachers, supervisors, youth movement executives, etc.).
"
If we minimize this relationship (...), then the Church of Christ in France no longer has a future, if not in the form of a small moralizing sect
," Bishop Ravel warned.
The Archbishop of Strasbourg had indicated at a press conference that he had appointed an "
episcopal delegate for the fight against sexual abuse
", put in place a "
code of pastoral relations
" or even signed a "
protocol
" with the prosecutors of 'Alsace in which he undertook "
to systematically report sexual offenses
".
