We know the name Abbé Pierre, but few of us know the man himself or his extraordinary life. He was a priest as we wish there were many more—above all because he stood unflinchingly with the poorest.
Reading this long interview carefully, you will discover not only the milestones of his life and his work (so remarkable that John XXIII, when nuncio in Paris, said to him: "Come warm me: you are my burning coal"), but above all his deep love for God, which ceaselessly inspired his struggle and creativity on behalf of the most abandoned brothers and sisters.
This calling led him to join the Resistance, to save Jews by smuggling them into Switzerland, to serve as a deputy in the Fourth Republic, to become a personal friend of General De Gaulle and other political figures.
Friend to the poor, the handicapped, the cast out, the homeless—Abbé Pierre was an uncomfortable figure, one who did not hesitate to speak, to cry out, to burn with righteous anger at injustice.
This is a book you read with hunger because it warms the heart, because it restores your desire to believe, to hope, to love more fully.
We recommend it to adults, to parents of handicapped children, to priests, to young people. The book itself is dedicated to them by Abbé Pierre: "To all of you, the young of this troubled world—girls and boys facing the day that rises over your lives, in your hands... Understand, live: to live truly means to make Love credible; to make credible that we are all loved; to make credible that all of us can learn to love forever...".
M.B., 1985