c. 2005 Religion News Service

PARIS _ He has been described as a saint, a male Mother Teresa and France’s moral compass. For a few dark months, he also was vilified for defending an old friend who questioned the grisly magnitude of the Holocaust.

More than half a century after Abbe Pierre first launched a call to arms against poverty and exclusion one frigid winter, the 92-year-old priest has catapulted to superstar status _ even abroad, where the secular charity he founded, Emmaus International, now operates in 50 countries.

At home, the frail Capuchin father with the cane and scraggly beard was voted France’s most popular personality year after year _ easily beating out soccer star Zinedine Zidane, crooner Patricia Kaas and French President Jacques Chirac _ until Abbe Pierre took himself out of the running.

That he is so beloved in a country where church attendance and respect for religious institutions has plummeted in recent decades seems a mystery.

“It’s true he’s a priest, but he’s first and foremost a good man who loves us, and takes firm stances,” said Raymond Etienne, president of the Abbe Pierre Foundation, a Paris-based nonprofit that works on homeless and housing issues. “He always tells the truth, whether he’s talking to a minister or to a simple man on the street.”

Abbe Pierre’s plain talk has clearly impressed street veteran Jean-Luc Muller, who spun dreams of finding a steady job and home at an Emmaus in Paris on a recent rain-soaked morning.

“Abbe Pierre is a great guy,” said Muller, 49, neatly dressed and clutching a blue plastic briefcase. “He’s done wonderful things. He’s got to keep going.”

Nearby, immigrants from North Africa and Eastern Europe sipped steaming coffee and munched on thick slices of bread. Several said they had heard of the priest, if only by word of mouth.

“People say he’s a good man who has done a lot during his life,” said 37-year-old Juba Nasser, an Algerian who lives in France.

The Paris office is one of dozens of Emmaus centers in France. It offers a variety of health and social services, along with job counseling and legal advice to help reinsert the excluded back into society. Other centers recycle and resell junk, employing the poor they serve.

“Sometimes we know we’ve been successful because we’ve guided someone to work or housing,” said Alain Raillard, head of Emmaus associations in the Paris region. “But with people who’ve been on the street a long time, who have psychological problems, it’s really difficult.”

For many French, Abbe Pierre is the face of Emmaus _ the man they think of when they volunteer and donate to the association. But the priest first made his mark as a member of the French resistance during World War II, helping Jews flee to neutral Switzerland.

The son of an affluent textile manager in Lyon, the man born Henri Groues chose the church over dreams of becoming a sailor. In 1945, he was elected to France’s National Assembly, and began campaigning for the homeless.

Four years later, he founded the first community to construct lodging. He named it Emmaus, after the biblical village where Jesus was given shelter.

But it wasn’t until a particularly icy winter in 1954 that Abbe Pierre caught the nation’s ear and heart. After a homeless woman froze to death on the Paris streets, he launched a radio appeal for help. Heaters, blankets, furniture and money poured in for the needy. Abbe Pierre repeated his call before the French parliament, which subsequently launched a program to build 12,000 shelters.

“I don’t react like politicians or economists,” Abbe Pierre said during a recent interview at his modest home in the drab Paris suburb of Alfortville, as he tried to explain his mission. “I’ve simply reacted to the suffering that faces me.”

Never a strong man, he is the first to admit he is slowing down. He moves slowly and wears a hearing aid. He is usually in bed by 8 p.m.

Why is he so popular?

“I have no idea,” he said. “It’s not something I think much about.”

(BEGIN FIRST OPTIONAL TRIM)

Now, after years of talk show rounds and newspaper interviews, his gaunt face is a ubiquitous reminder of the country’s have nots. Emmaus centers abroad, including those in the United States, have blossomed. They have added health care, literacy and human rights campaigns to their battles for better housing.

And despite his age, Abbe Pierre still speaks passionately as he describes a “housing crisis” facing France’s working class, who are often unable to afford soaring real estate prices. In a report published earlier this year, his foundation estimated roughly 3 million people have a hard time finding shelter in France.

In Alfortville, an immigrant-heavy town where Abbe Pierre has lived for years, residents describe him as a neighborhood fixture.

“Ever since the war, he’s been there when people need help,” said Bernadette Lagard, who owns a flower shop next to the priest’s home. “It’s not because he’s a Catholic that we love him. It’s because of who he is as a human being.”

(END FIRST OPTIONAL TRIM)

Abbe Pierre’s religious views fall more in line with many non-practicing French Catholics than with the Vatican’s. He supports marriage for priests and the use of condoms. His Emmaus charity is staunchly secular.

Such maverick positions are similar to those of another popular Catholic figure in France, Sister Emmanuelle. The two know each other and talk regularly _ though Abbe Pierre is said to complain that Emmanuelle talks too much.

Abbe Pierre himself is hardly laconic, his friends say, and he is fond of playing practical jokes.

“He’s just as likely to be watching a soccer game as praying in a church,” said Etienne, the foundation head, who has known the priest for 35 years. “If you made him into a saint it would be detestable. He’s a man with all his qualities and weaknesses.”

France saw Abbe Pierre’s weaker side in 1996, when he initially defended a book written by his friend Roger Garaudy that suggested the extent of Jewish exterminations in Nazi concentration camps was exaggerated.

The incident sparked an uproar in France, and harsh denunciations from the Jewish community and anti-discrimination groups. The New York-based Anti-Defamation League urged Catholic authorities to take disciplinary action against Abbe Pierre at the time, and the church reprimanded the priest.

Abbe Pierre partially retracted his defense of Garaudy and apologized publicly. Today he is unwilling to talk about the matter.

“He made one mistake _ he trusted Garaudy,” Etienne said, adding that Abbe Pierre had not read the book before defending it and the author. “Garaudy used him to help his book sales.”

But these days the controversy appears all but forgotten. Abbe Pierre has the ear of Chirac and his government. A recent meeting on homelessness, sponsored by Abbe Pierre’s foundation, was packed with politicians and journalists. Thunderous applause greeted his brief concluding remarks.

Once its founder is gone, Emmaus “won’t have all this media attention,” Etienne said. “This foundation will continue after he’s gone, but nobody can replace Abbe Pierre.”

Sitting in his modest study in Alfortville, the priest makes light of his succession, and of his legacy.

“A reporter once asked me what I wanted to have written on my gravestone,” he said. “And I told him: `that he tried to love.’

He paused. “And I’ve tried.”

MO/RB END RNS