“I was up against the wall. As Catholics, we must defend our religion. » This is how a member of Civitas defended himself before the criminal court of Lorient (Morbihan) to justify his presence near a church in Carnac.
This day in May 2023, this member of the small fundamentalist Catholic group contributed to preventing the taking of a concert by an American musician organized with the agreement of the diocese in the Saint-Cornely church. For these acts of obstruction, he was sentenced to five months in prison on Monday by the criminal court.
The man was found guilty of “concerted obstruction with threat of the exercise of freedom of expression” for having prevented a concert by American organist Kali Malone. He will have to pay one euro for moral damages and 1,200 euros for legal costs to this musician and composer. “It’s a desecration,” he declared at the hearing. Another defendant, prosecuted for intentional violence against a Carnac municipal councilor, was acquitted.
The court rejected the request for additional information from Me Vincent Tolédano, lawyer for Kali Malone, who had deplored, during the hearing on March 13, that the other demonstrators were not being prosecuted.
A dissolution pronounced last year
The fundamentalist group Civitas was dissolved by Interior Minister Gérald Darmanin in 2023 because of its positions with anti-Semitic overtones. Founded in 1999, this far-right fundamentalist Christian movement seeks “the submission of civil law to the doctrine of the Church”.