Pope to honour slain French priest with Vatican mass

Pope Francis will celebrate mass on Wednesday in honour of Jacques Hamel, the French priest who died in July after having his throat slit by Islamist militants.

Muslims joined Christians in a mass to pay tribute to priest Jacques Hamel in the Rouen Cathedral on 31 July File/RFI

Around 80 pilgrims from the diocese of Rouen in northern France will attend the early morning service in the chapel at St Martha's, the boarding house where Francis stays.

Vatican spokesman Greg Burke said Francis wanted to "show his closeness" to 85-year-old Hamel's friends, relatives and parishioners in the small town of Saint-Etienne-du-Rouvray, near Rouen.

The elderly priest was killed on 26 July while presiding over an early morning mass for a handful of parishioners.

At a funeral held for him in early August, Rouen Archbishop Dominique Lebrun said, "As brutal and unfair and horrible as Jacques' death was, we have to look deep into our hearts to find the light."

Hamel's attackers, both 19, were shot dead by police. The so-called Islamic State armed group subsequently claimed they had murdered the priest on its behalf.