Last Survivor of Tibhirine Massacre Remembered: Brother Jean-Pierre’s Legacy Lives On

A trained nursing assistant, Brother Nuno de São José, 47, was "very close" to Brother Jean-Pierre Schumacher, the last surviving monk of the Tibhirine massacre who died on November 21, 2021 at the age of 97 at the Notre-Dame de l’Atlas monastery located in Midelt, Morocco. Brother Nuno, one of the five Trappists of the monastery, was by his side when he died. He keeps from "his best friend" the memory of a man of exemplary faithfulness. "He had the concern to pray. Whenever we went to the doctor, he took his breviary with him... An hour before dying, he had his breakfast, then he told me: ’Now I’m going to pray the office’," he recounts to Aleteia.

The monk made an effort to answer all the letters he received. He had to learn German at the age of 94 in order to respond to a nun who was addressing him in that language. "It was like an expression of his sense of responsibility and friendship," explains Brother Nuno, who also describes a man "always grateful." "He thanked us for our care and attention and said he was spoiled. He was easily in gratitude for small services of nothing at all." And he adds: "He had a predisposition to a certain joy... His smile was for everyone: for the brothers and for the visitors."

But like any human being, he also had his bad character traits. "He could be stubborn about unimportant things. Sometimes we argued, but if he realized he had missed something, he was able to ask for forgiveness," says Brother Nuno, who recounts having found him one day in the cemetery, overwhelmed but singing. To testify that his joy always prevailed in all circumstances.