Parishioners Choose Priest Over Church

Via the Times Online:

Worshippers in the Pyrenees are planning an Ascension Day protest tomorrow in support of their village priest, who was dismissed by the Roman Catholic Church for having an affair with a widow.

The demonstrators want to voice their anger over the sacking of Father Léon Laclau, a popular curate who flouted church rules by living openly with a Dutch nurse he met 22 years ago.

Father Léon, 55, was asked to leave southern France for the Ivory Coast in West Africa after his order, the Congregation the Sacred Heart of Jesus of Betharram, denounced his behaviour as "too scandalous".

Pierre Molères, the Bishop of Bayonne, said that the priest had reneged on his vow of chastity, refused "brotherly advice" to end his relationship and placed himself in a "complicated situation".

Father Léon’s removal has stirred fierce controversy in the Notre-Dame-du-Piémont parish, near Pau in the French Pyrenees. More than 1,500 people took part in a public meeting where the priest’s supporters said that his affair with Marga Lamadou, 57, was widely known and accepted locally.

A week later 400 of them boycotted Mass, which was celebrated by a substitute priest. They demonstrated outside the village church and put up banners demanding, "Give us back Father Léon".

And it gets worse:

Father Léon said: “It is a permanent tension to live a forbidden love. But
love is always the strongest. My story is simple and true. I could very well
have said that Marga was my housekeeper but that really would not have been very
brave.”

In a statement sent to parishioners, he said: “Far from stopping me from
carrying out my job as a priest, Marga helped me and encouraged me through her
enthusiasm and her vision of the world and the Church and through her
faith.”

Here's the whole story.

"But that really would not have been very brave." At least he got that right. However, the truly courageous thing to do would be to simply live out his vows.