L’ISLE-VERTE, Quebec — Hundreds of mourners and dignitaries filled a church Saturday in L’Isle-Verte, Quebec, to pay tribute to the 24 people who died, and the eight people still missing, after a fire burned down a seniors’ residence.
About 900 people, including Prime Minister Stephen Harper and Governor General David Johnston, packed into the Saint-Jean-Baptiste Church.
“This is a very big tragedy,” Harper said after the Mass. “It’s something that everybody can identify with. We all have or have had parents, grandparents, who become elderly, who are terribly vulnerable, and when we see something like this, it just breaks the hearts of everybody.”
The Rev. Pierre-André Fournier, archbishop of Rimouski, hailed the work of first responders in the Jan. 23 blaze.
“It is difficult for you and I to realize what happened and what we’re going through,” Fournier told the congregation. “Thirty-two members of our Christian community have left us tragically.” The Associated Press
