Word: abbe
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...went into politics, and in 1946 became a deputy to the National Assembly. But his real vocation slid casually into his life with a young couple and a baby who had just been evicted and had nowhere to go. Abbé Pierre bedded them down in his ramshackle house in a run-down Paris suburb. In no time, the word got around that the "abbé with the beard" was a soft touch. His house became headquarters for the homeless...
...Franc Question. Abbé Pierre bought the barrack buildings of an old prisoner-of-war camp on credit and set them up in vacant lots. Here he charged 15? for a night's lodging, took in 5,000 people a year and showed a profit. But more money was needed to build more houses, and when an ex-ragpicker suggested collecting junk and selling it, Abbé Pierre promptly organized such an efficient scavenger system that they soon needed a truck...
...Abbé Pierre made a pilgrimage to a quiz program, Quitte ou Double (Double or Nothing). He was accepted as a contestant and after a few questions had a stack of francs. Yes, he said, he would try another question. "What is the meaning of F.A.O.?" the master of ceremonies asked. "Food and Agriculture Organization," answered the priest. "Right. Do you want to go on?" asked the M.C. Abbé Pierre made a rapid calculation. "No," he said. The Abbé had 256,000 francs ($730), and the junk business had its first truck...
...Abbé Pierre puts no religious price tag on membership in his communities. "You'll get your soup whether you believe or not," he tells the people who come. But the Abbé's example has its effect; one group has constructed a shrine to the Virgin out of wood and terra cotta and calls its area Notre Dame des Sans Logis (Our Lady of the Homeless). Behind his own house is a tiny brick chapel where Abbé Pierre regularly says Mass for the two priests, five seminarians and twelve laymen who work with...
...Saints & Heroes. Abbé Pierre and the cruel cold have brought a new mood to Paris. He has even established a modern version of the medieval institution of sanctuary by persuading the police to promise that no one in a shelter shall be asked for his identity papers. But Abbé Pierre knows well how quickly a rise in temperature can melt the city's new found concern. "It's not enough to prevent miserable people from dying in the streets," he says. "They have to be helped so they can live like...