Quebec City community holds mass, creates schoolyard monument to honour victims
Children, Catholics, Muslims join together to show unity in face of deadly attack
On Tuesday evening, hundreds crowded into a church in the Quebec City suburb of Sainte-Foy for a commemorative mass that was held for the victims of Sunday night's mosque shooting.
Muslims from the nearby Islamic cultural centre, where the attack occurred, joined the 7 p.m. service at the Notre-Dame-du-Foy church.
The co-founder of the Centre culturel islamique de Québec, Boufeldja Benabdallah, spoke to the congregation before the service started.
He received a long standing ovation and began his speech with praise for Quebec and Canada.
"As Muslims, we believe we have many things. But we have received so much from the people of Quebec," Benabdallah said.
At some moments, he began to tear up as he spoke about the families affected by the shooting which killed six men.
"Children will say, 'Father, father,' and he won't be there," he said.
Before the mass, Cardinal Gérald Cyprien Lacroix, the archbishop of Quebec, spoke alongside him outside the church.
"Despite the horrific events which took place in Quebec, we hope some good comes of this," Cyprien Lacroix said.
"I agree with you 100 per cent," Benabdallah added.
Elementary school prayer
Earlier in the day, students at the Notre-Dame-De-Foy school made a monument for the victims of the mosque shooting.
The children placed messages of unity in the snow.
None of them lost a parent in the shooting, but it still affected many deeply.
They knelt in prayer after having placed their paper stars into a mini-monument in their school yard.