Helping refugees resist becoming religiously radicalized
Interview with the chaplain at Caritas France center in Paris that offers practical and spiritual assistance to those who are in exile from their homeland
“The aim is to get to know each other and live together in peace,” says Pascal Leseur, describing his chaplaincy work at “Le Cèdre”, a center that Caritas France (Secours Catholique) operates in Paris to assist refugees. “It's not always easy,” says the priest. “The religious question brings interior peace, but practicing it can also generate tensions.”
In an interview with La Croix’s Marguerite de Lasa, Leseur spoke about his efforts at developing initiatives to foster mutual religious understanding among migrants.
La Croix: Do the migrants you welcome at Le Cèdre have any spiritual concerns?
Pascal Leseur: Not immediately. People come first and foremost to meet their primary needs: eating, washing, seeking asylum. And many of them understand that in France, religion is a very private and personal issue.
What comes up again and again in their stories, however, is that prayer is the only thing that remains in the big crossings. When you have to let go of everything – your country, your family – you cling to God.
This was a powerful, indelible human experience for them. Then, when they arrive in France, there’s a huge void: they have the feeling that, from the outside, nothing is religious anymore. It's a disorientation, because they discover that what they've received from their parents, without asking too many questions, is not at all experienced in the same way elsewhere.
How do they react to this change of scenery?
If they're not very structured in their faith, many will abandon religious practice. Others may, on the contrary, become radicalized, hardening their tone by thinking that they're the only ones who are right, and that we're in too permissive a society.
Much depends on the network or community into which they manage to integrate in France. The most inclusive religious communities are often evangelical ones, because of the warmth of their welcome and the network of mutual support they provide.
What's more, some exiles develop a form of syncretism: they go to the evangelical church as well as the mosque. When the presence of God is no longer as palpable as it was in the country of origin, and what needs to be done is less clear-cut, people go and seek everywhere.
I have the feeling that their primary criteria for approaching a community are warmth and mutual support, rather than theological questions. Many feel that all religions refer to the same God.
How can you accompany them spiritually?
We have a spiritual group with which we will, for example, visit a synagogue, the Great Mosque of Paris, a church. We also organize sharing sessions during Lent, or fast-breaking sessions during Ramadan. At these moments, those in exile feel welcome in their own spiritual tradition.
The aim is to get to know each other and live together in peace. It's not always easy: the religious question brings interior peace, but practicing it can also generate tensions.
Sometimes some of the migrants who come to the center start praying in a corner, and this can offend volunteers. Some have never had a relationship with any religious sensibility other than their own, and may think that their way is the only way to salvation. We try to show that other choices are legitimate.
The Taizé brothers, who live in Pantin, also come once a month to pray with us. The advantage of their songs is that they often speak to Christians and Muslims alike.