“Because of the pressures or their suffering, the police can lose the sense of service”

The May Day demonstrations were punctuated by numerous incidents in France, injuring more than 400 police and gendarmes (1). Is our society getting used to the violence perpetrated against the forces of order?

Father Denis Chautard : Unfortunately, these have really become recurrent and are increasing in both quantity and intensity. In most cases, the demonstrations, when they are well supervised on the trade union level, do not experience such outbursts. But things get tough when thugs – wearing helmets, armed with Molotov cocktails… – come to break into the protest movements to do battle with the police.

The balance sheet of the day of May 1 is distressing, with more than 400 police officers and gendarmes injured. This is the first time that such a figure has been reached and it is extremely serious. Tested in the accomplishment of their mission, discredited by the population within our society which is going through a crisis of authority, the police need support. They proportionally represent the second most experienced profession in France for its suicide rate, behind farmers.

Does this question of their overexposure to violence occupy a growing place in your spiritual accompaniment with them?

D. C. : Yes, they tell us about that. As a chaplain to the police, I spend a lot of time listening to them and showing them my support. I was re-reading Pope Francis’ message these days to the families of the victims and those who have fallen into service with the Italian State Police (21 May 2015, editor’s note) which says this: “Whoever serves with courage and self-sacrifice the community encounters, with the difficulties and risks linked to their role, a very high form of self-realization, because they walk in the way of Our Lord, who wanted to serve and not to be served. »

However, faced with the immense difficulties they encounter, the police themselves end up losing – because of pressure or their suffering – this sense of service and the common good which is the honor of their profession.

Christian police officers told me to pray before being confronted with situations that could turn violent, in particular to be able to keep their cool: for me, this testifies to a remarkable spiritual attitude. A policeman from the BAC-nuit de Paris told me that prayer also allowed him to keep his calm next to a warmonger leader, seeking to retaliate immediately with force or violence… This question of the adjustment of the response is central, at the risk otherwise of pouring into police violence in turn – very far from being the majority, but unfortunately existing.

How to find a way of calming down in this particularly tense social climate? And how can Christian hope contribute to this?

D. C. : Whenever there is the possibility of a dialogue, it must be seized. She is always a winner. Another example, I am thinking of this police commissioner who regularly went to speak with the young people of the neighboring city: it was a success for each side. Unfortunately, dialogue is not always possible. The demonstrations are today places of crystallization of violence and conflicts; but I think that despite everything, we can also find possibilities for mediation there.

Christian hope can contribute to this, insofar as it brings something unique to our relationship with others. Whether he is a policeman or a protester, a Christian considers the other as his brother, without trying to confine him to a negative judgment. By recognizing him as a human being in his own right and with equal dignity, he thinks that the other must also have a basis of kindness and generosity. The Gospel is filled with all these stories in which the adversaries talk to each other, reach out to each other, and end up, despite their oppositions, by going part of the way together.

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