France in shock over murder of young convert and pro-life activist Quentin Deranque

The alleged murder at the hands of far-left activists of Quentin Deranque, a young Frenchman who had converted to Catholicism and was committed to pastoral life, has caused profound shock in France.

The 23-year-old died in a Lyon hospital on Feb. 14 after being brutally beaten two days earlier during a pro-Palestinian conference organized by the left-wing party La France Insoumise (“unbowed/defiant”) at the Lyon Institute of Political Studies.

Authorities are continuing to investigate in an attempt to identify those responsible for the attack, although initial hypotheses suggest that members of the so-called Young Guard, a group linked to the political organization that put on the event, may be involved. The event was hosted by a far-left member of the European Parliament, Rima Hassan.

The young man, a tennis enthusiast and a philosophy student known for his pro-life activism — according to his lawyer, Fabien Rajon — had attended the event intending to demonstrate peacefully alongside the Nemesis collective, founded in 2019 to defend the rights of women in the West against certain currents of contemporary feminism.

La France Insoumise supports abortion, contraception, gender ideology, homosexual adoption, and assisted suicide and opposes so-called conversion therapy.

A member of St. George Parish in Lyon, Deranque also belonged to the traditionalist congregation Priestly Fraternity of St. Peter (FSSP). During a memorial service held on Feb. 15 at St. George Church, parish priest Father Laurent Spriet urged prayers for his soul and emphasized that now “is a time for compassion, respect, prayer, and to let the police and the justice system do their work.”

According to the young man’s lawyer, who spoke to the local press, Deranque was the victim of a “methodically prepared ambush” by “organized and trained individuals, vastly superior in number and armed, some with their faces masked, who had apparently conducted prior reconnaissance and presumably had accomplices.”

French President Emmanuel Macron called for calm after the attack and stated that “no cause or ideology will ever justify killing.”

Marine Le Pen, a French member of Parliament and a leading member of the far-right National Rally party, urged the French government to abandon “its passivity in the face of far-left militias that, for years, protected by the complacency and support of parties like La France Insoumise, have been increasing intimidation, threats, and attacks in public spaces.”

“Democracy cannot continue to tolerate those who seek to destroy it. Given the seriousness of the threats and the clearly manifested criminal intentions, the government must consider these militias as terrorist groups. This means that they be treated as such and that the current laws and regulations on the matter be applied to them,” she wrote on X.

After the young man’s death, Le Pen emphasized that “the unfathomable pain of losing a child should not be compounded by the unbearable impunity of those responsible for this lynching. It will be up to the justice system to judge and condemn with the utmost firmness this criminal act of unprecedented violence.”

This story was first published by ACI Prensa, the Spanish-language sister service of EWTN News. It has been translated and adapted by EWTN News English.