Kevon Felmine

Se­nior Re­porter

De­spite a break-in that dis­rupt­ed op­er­a­tions at the Pro Cathe­dral of Our La­dy of Per­pet­u­al Help in San Fer­nan­do yes­ter­day morn­ing, parish priest Fr Matthew d’Here­aux said the in­ci­dent would not stop God’s work.

The break-in was dis­cov­ered around 5.20 am when the church was opened ahead of the sched­uled 7.30 am Mass. Po­lice were con­tact­ed and ar­rived short­ly af­ter­wards, while crime scene per­son­nel con­duct­ed in­ves­ti­ga­tions and state­ments were tak­en from peo­ple who were present at the church. There was mi­nor dam­age to church win­dows and prop­er­ty, but no mon­ey or valu­ables were stolen. The in­ci­dent af­fect­ed the parish’s morn­ing ac­tiv­i­ties, with Mass­es, bap­tisms and wed­dings moved to the near­by Bish­op Mendes Au­di­to­ri­um while the church was as­sessed. Church ac­tiv­i­ties re­sumed af­ter po­lice gave clear­ance for the build­ing to re­open.

Fr d’Here­aux praised the re­sponse from the of­fi­cers who at­tend­ed the scene.

“The po­lice ar­rived in a time­ly man­ner. The crime scene in­ves­ti­ga­tors ar­rived in a time­ly man­ner. And I com­mend their work, and hope­ful­ly we will find the per­pe­tra­tor and place him on a path of re­ha­bil­i­ta­tion,” he said.

For the parish priest, how­ev­er, the in­ci­dent rep­re­sent­ed more than dam­age to a build­ing. He de­scribed it as a vi­o­la­tion of a sa­cred space and called for greater re­spect for places of wor­ship, pri­vate prop­er­ty and peo­ple’s homes.

“A sad day in the life of the Church, be­cause at the end of the day, the Church is sa­cred, it’s a sa­cred space, and we should re­spect the sa­cred space.” He said that re­spect should ex­tend to all places of wor­ship.

“We should re­spect masjids and tem­ples and church­es. We should al­so re­spect, I think, peo­ple’s homes, be­cause that’s sa­cred as well,” he said.

Fr d’Here­aux said so­ci­ety must recog­nise the im­por­tance of bound­aries and pri­vate prop­er­ty, point­ing to one of the com­mand­ments cen­tral to Chris­t­ian teach­ing.

“We must re­spect bound­aries; we must re­spect pri­vate prop­er­ty. Thou shalt not steal, that’s one of our com­mand­ments. If we could all obey that com­mand­ment, Thou shalt not steal,” he said.

He said some­one who breaks in­to a church shows dis­re­spect not on­ly to­wards God and the Church com­mu­ni­ty, but al­so to­wards them­selves.

D’Here­aux said he sus­pect­ed the per­son re­spon­si­ble may have been search­ing for some­thing that could be sold for a quick re­turn, pos­si­bly linked to sub­stance abuse, but he called for re­ha­bil­i­ta­tion rather than con­dem­na­tion.

“Again, no to the drug trade, no to sub­stance abuse, no to drugs, be­cause it takes us down a road of des­per­a­tion. It takes us down a road of dis­re­spect.” De­spite the dis­rup­tion, d’Here­aux said the parish would con­tin­ue its work. “Noth­ing will stop the work of God. We will con­tin­ue,” he said.

The break-in at Our La­dy of Per­pet­u­al Help RC Church fol­lows a June 2 in­ci­dent at St Mary’s RC Church in St James, where two mon­strances used dur­ing Eu­charis­tic ado­ra­tion were stolen.

Parish priest Fr Em­manuel Pierre con­front­ed the in­trud­er, who fled the scene with­out harm­ing him. The sa­cred ves­sels were re­turned on June 12 in a garbage bag along with a hand­writ­ten let­ter of apol­o­gy and $100. One of the mon­strances sus­tained mi­nor dam­age, but both were re­cov­ered.

Ear­li­er this year, on March 17, armed men en­tered the Church Street, Laven­tille com­pound of the Mis­sion­ar­ies of Char­i­ty and stole phones, cash and oth­er valu­ables be­long­ing to the Re­li­gious Sis­ters.

For Fr d’Here­aux, the re­sponse to the in­ci­dent re­mains root­ed in faith and a com­mit­ment to con­tin­ue the Church’s work.

“We have to be our broth­er and sis­ter’s keep­er,” he said. “We have to re­spect one an­oth­er.”