ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Sunday, September 1, 1996 TAG: 9609030069
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL PAGE: A-14 EDITION: METRO
DATELINE: PARIS
SOURCE: Associated Press
THE POPE SEPARATED the outspoken bishop from his flock. Now the French-Catholic ministers to the masses via the World Wide Web.
The pope took away Jacques Gaillot's flock, but fate gave him a Macintosh. No longer a rural bishop, he is monsignor to the masses, who champions the downtrodden with a worldwide reach.
``I don't know much about this electronic business, but it seems to work,'' said Gaillot, who at 60 still prefers noisy street marches and living with squatters. ``Maybe this will help.''
He offered his technical aide's tally of who has approached his virtual diocese, located only in cyberspace. In just the first six weeks of 1996, his Web site had a quarter-million ``hits.''
The number now soars. From Sydney to Sitka, he is consulted via the Internet on everything from poignant spiritual dilemmas to matters better left to Dear Abby.
Gaillot accepts no confessions by computer, but otherwise he offers all the spiritual comforts of a parish priest.
Still a Roman Catholic bishop, Gaillot plans to be among the prelates welcoming Pope Jean Paul II to France on Sept. 19. He does not expect overwhelming warmth. The Vatican declines any comment.
``I miss my parishioners, but now I can address people everywhere,'' he said, irony playing across the soft features of a round, gentle face. ``I must remember to thank the Holy Father.''
In January 1995, Gaillot was fired from his post as bishop of Evreux, a diocese of 550,000 Catholics northwest of Paris, an area that includes desperate ghettos of Arab and African immigrants.
No explanation was given, but the hierarchy apparently had enough of Gaillot's outspoken and much-publicized stands against French policies on immigrants, the homeless and others known as ``the excluded.''
Gaillot also defends homosexuality, supports marriage for priests and speaks out on other matters that he says involve individual choice rather than religious doctrine.
Reaction was lively, and mixed. Thousands thronged the majestic Evreux Cathedral for Gaillot's last Mass, a day that he remembers as the most moving of his life. Polls said two-thirds of French Catholics opposed the dismissal.
But many traditional-minded Catholics declare themselves outraged at unorthodox views that some call apostasy.
Having removed him from Evreux, the Vatican had to find Gaillot what it calls a titular see. Bishops, ordained by God, cannot be stricken from the rolls unless excommunicated. They need a diocese, even if it is a symbolic one.
The answer was the ``Diocese of Partenia,'' a no-longer-existent territory somewhere in the dunes of southern Algeria that ceased to be a real place inhabited by Catholics in the fifth century.
Soon, a political philosopher and Internet whiz named Leo Scheer offered Gaillot an idea: If Partenia was nowhere, then it was also everywhere. If he had no pulpit, he could have a home page.
Anyone who taps out ``http://www.partenia.fr'' calls up the face that France knows so well: laugh wrinkles, gold wire-rimmed glasses, sparse panels of graying hair flanking a shiny bald pate.
A map shows a patch of Sahara. Users can download the bishop's latest book, ``Friends of Partenia,'' in French or English. A newsletter reports on little-known and lost causes.
In a defense of the German theologian Eugen Drewermann, Gaillot echoes his own main theme: ``He allows people who are disappointed with the church, or are far away from it, to be free to speak.''
All e-mail gets an answer, hunted and pecked by Gaillot's own index finger.
``I spend hours a day at it,'' the bishop said at the single room where he lives and works.
The tidy room, above the less tidy office of Partenia 2000, is decorated only with the icon of a black Madonna, a gift from priests at Evreux and a small stylized crucifix.
Gaillot is unsure where he stands with Rome. He receives a bishop's salary, if no expense money. Last December, a friendly but frank chat with the pope brought neither a new post nor a reprimand.
LENGTH: Medium: 83 lines ILLUSTRATION: PHOTO: AP. Jacques Gaillot works with his computer in Paris,by CNBreaching out to people via the Internet.