“Sport is for peace”: the Variétés club of France faces the national selection of priests on Sunday

It is a meeting under the sign of fraternity with an interreligious coloring. Jacques Vendroux’s Variétés club de France will face for the first time a team of around twenty priests and nuns, this Sunday in Poissy at the Léo-Lagrande stadium from 3 p.m. This national selection, unique in its kind, is coached by Father Bertrand Cherrier, former player of the Girondins de Bordeaux.

“Nothing is more beautiful than human gathering”

For the occasion, the Variétés club de France will be reinforced by the presence of one of the imams of the Ivry mosque, Mohamed Ahsaini, the Grand Rabbi of France, Haïm Korsia, pastor of the Protestant Church of Clamart , Amos Ngoua Mouri, but also the Bishop of Dignes, representative of the Pope for the Olympic Games, Monseigneur Emmanuel Gobillard, also an active member of the Variétés club de France. “The goal is to say that sport is for peace. ‘Fight’ on the field, be loyal adversaries, give everything but after the match and the rest of the time, be brothers,” affirms the latter.

For the Grand Rabbi of France, Haïm Korsia, who will play on Sunday, this meeting is a beautiful sign of fraternity: “This difference, believers, atheists, people who hope, who believe in God or in Man, whatever, it will constitute a form of hope to see us gathered together. I think that nothing is more beautiful than human gathering.

This match will be refereed by Mgr Lebrun, archbishop of Rouen, former football referee, and the kick-off will be given by Michel Drucker and the legend of PSG, the Brazilian Rai. Please note that a prayer will take place just before the meeting in memory of the victims of the Furiani tragedy, on May 5, 1992. Admission is free.