In 1967 Gérard de Sède spuriously claimed that when Abbé Rivière, parish priest of Espéraza, officiated Saunière's Last Rites at his deathbed in 1917 he was given such a “terrible secret” it left him so traumatised he never smiled again. Gérard de Sède never explained where he got his information from about this story. Despite Gérard de Sède's story being discredited by Monsignor Georges Boyer as soon as L'Or de Rennes was first published in 1967, it is still embraced by the Rennes-le-Château conspiracy theorists of today in 2015.

Consequently, the Great War Memorial 1914-1918 that Abbé Rivière installed in his church in Espéraza (bearing the words “Aux Enfants d'Espéraza Morts Pour la France”) – at the same time as other such Great War Memorials were installed all over France – is turned into a mystery and secret of Christian origins because part of the said Memorial incorporates the sculpted figure of Christ in his tomb with his eyes open (above which stands a sculpted crucifixion).

The Rennes-le-Château conspiracy theorists never give the full facts about the Great War Memorial 1914-1918 in Espéraza church. It is obvious that the sculpted figure of Jesus Christ in the tomb represents France's suffering of the fallen soldiers and the struggle to rebuild the Nation.