Advocate for Social Justice and “Christian Democracy”

The year 1848 brought upheaval to Europe – a wave of revolutions swept through France, Italy, and beyond, as people rose against old regimes demanding liberty and social reform. Frédéric Ozanam was 35 that year. As both a French citizen and a Catholic thinker, he could not remain indifferent to these events. In February 1848, the French king Louis-Philippe was overthrown, and a republic was declared. Tumult filled the streets of Paris; barricades went up, there were clashes, and later in June a bloody workers’ insurrection erupted when workshops for the unemployed were closed. It was a time of both hope and chaos.

Ozanam saw in 1848 not just a political revolution but what he called a “social revolution” – a cry from the masses of poor and working-class people for dignified living conditions. His experiences over 15 years visiting the poor had taught him how desperate things were for many: low wages, unemployment, lack of basic rights. Ozanam believed the new republic had to address these social issues, or it would fail.

French Revolution of 1848

At the same time, as a devout Catholic, Ozanam was keenly aware that many of those leading the revolutionary movements were hostile to the Church, seeing it as allied with the old monarchies. He felt a profound calling to help reconcile the Church with the modern aspirations of liberty, equality, and fraternity – the famed motto of the French Republic. Rather than reject these ideals as born of revolution, Ozanam daringly claimed they were essentially Christian – in other words, the political expression of Gospel values. This was a bold stance. Many conservative Catholics at the time were alarmed by 1848 and clung to monarchist or authoritarian views. Ozanam instead aligned himself with the rising idea of “Catholic democracy.” By “Christian democracy,” he meant a social order where democratic freedoms and participation were embraced, but guided by Christian principles of justice and charity.

In practical terms, Ozanam did two things in 1848: he stepped briefly into politics by standing as a candidate, and he co-founded a newspaper, L’Ère Nouvelle, to spread ideas. When France held elections for a Constituent Assembly in 1848, Ozanam, out of civic duty, allowed his name to be put forward as a candidate in Paris and also in Lyon (his hometown). He wasn’t a seasoned politician, but he felt one could not shrink from responsibility when the nation’s future was at stake. In his public declaration to voters of the Rhône (Lyon’s region), he advocated a France where the Church would stand with the people, not against their rights. Ozanam was not elected; in a way, this was a relief for him – he was not really seeking power, and not being in the Assembly left him freer to write and teach. But the fact that he ran at all shows his sense of lay Catholics’ duty to engage in public life, even high politics, when needed.

More enduring was his work with the pen. In April 1848, together with the famous Dominican preacher Henri Lacordaire and other liberal Catholic allies, Ozanam started a journal called “L’Ère Nouvelle” (The New Era). This newspaper became the voice of Catholics who supported the Republic and wanted social reform. Ozanam and his co-editors wrote articles urging the Church to side with the poor and working class. He pleaded that the clergy drop any aristocratic aloofness. He boldly told churchmen that if they did not care for workers as much as they care for the rich, the Church in France would be lost. These were strong words, almost scolding, but coming from Ozanam, who loved the Church deeply, they were prophetic calls for renewal. He saw the “new barbarians” of his time not as foreign invaders but the alienated urban proletariat who had been estranged from the Church. Just as in antiquity the Church converted and civilized the pagan barbarians, Ozanam argued, now the Church must “embrace and convert” the working masses by showing them Christ’s compassion. “Let us sacrifice our prejudices and turn to democracy, this proletariat which knows us not,” he urged Catholics.

This vision placed Ozanam at odds with both extremes: on the one hand, with socialist revolutionaries who wanted to marginalize the Church, and on the other hand, with reactionary Catholics who distrusted democracy. It was a delicate balancing act. Inevitably, criticism came. Some conservative Catholic journals accused Ozanam and L’Ère Nouvelle of being too socialist or too naïve. The conservative Catholic journalist Louis Veuillot even called Ozanam a deserter of the Catholic cause for favoring the Republic. Ozanam bore such attacks patiently, though they pained him. He believed history would judge who was right. Indeed, many of Ozanam’s ideas prefigured what the Church itself would officially endorse decades later in its social teachings – for example, the notion that workers have rights and that the Church should be a friend to the poor became Catholic doctrine with Pope Leo XIII’s Rerum Novarum in 1891. In 1848, however, Ozanam’s stance was ahead of its time.

L’Ère Nouvelle ran for about 18 months before financial difficulties and political pressures forced it to sell the publication. By late 1849, the revolutionary tide had ebbed; a more conservative regime (Louis-Napoléon, soon to declare himself Emperor Napoleon III) was coming to power, and the brief springtime of liberal Catholicism shrank. Ozanam returned to focus on his academic work and the Society of St. Vincent de Paul. But he continued to advocate for just social policies in whatever ways he could. For instance, he supported initiatives for a law allowing free association (so that workers could form mutual aid societies without government repression – something that had been banned). He also argued against those who thought the Church should rely on state power; he preferred the Church be independent and not tied to throne or empire. In fact, he openly supported the principle of separation of Church and state, an unusual stance for a 19th-century Catholic. He felt the Church would be freer and more respected if it wasn’t entangled with temporal power, a view vindicated in some ways by later history.

During the reactionary 1850s under Napoleon III, Ozanam’s prominence somewhat waned in public life – his health was failing too – but he had left a seed. Younger Catholics who witnessed his example were inspired to continue pushing for social action and engagement with democratic ideals. His friend and fellow academic Charles de Montalembert carried on some of that torch in parliamentary debates. Long after Ozanam’s death, those influenced by him would be among the architects of modern Catholic social teaching and political involvement.

Before his death, Frédéric had one more moment of joy in seeing the cause of the poor advanced: the new Pope Pius IX, elected in 1846, initially enacted liberalizing reforms in the Papal States, and Ozanam, who traveled in Italy in 1847, was thrilled by this and by Pius’s apparent sympathy for a “New Era” of Church engagement. Though Pius IX’s liberal phase was short-lived (he became much more conservative after 1848), for a time Ozanam saw a convergence of his hopes: a Pope advocating political openings and showing concern for the lower classes. It affirmed his belief that one could be fully Catholic yet embrace progress.

Reflection:
Faithful Citizenship and Social Reform

Frédéric Ozanam’s involvement in 1848 speaks loudly to young Catholics on the question of how to engage in politics and social change. He demonstrates that one can be passionately committed to justice and reform because of one’s faith. At a time when some feel the Church is always “behind” on social issues, Ozanam was out front, asserting that the Gospel demands action for justice here and now. For today’s youth disturbed by inequality, poverty, or injustice, Ozanam provides a model of constructive engagement: he didn’t join extremist or violent factions; he used reasoned argument, dialogue, and the tools of democracy (like voting, writing, peaceful advocacy) to work for change. He was both idealistic and practical – willing to collaborate with all people of good will, but always bringing his Christian conscience to the table.

His example also encourages lay people not to leave politics only to secular experts. Ozanam saw it as his duty as a lay Catholic to step into the public square. Today’s lay faithful likewise have the calling to shape society in light of the Gospel, whether as voters, activists, writers, or public servants. When confronted with secular ideologies or anti-religious rhetoric, Ozanam did not respond with defensiveness or withdrawal; he responded with better ideas and better service. This is a valuable lesson in our often polarized climate: we should show the truth of our beliefs by building bridges and offering solutions, rather than just denouncing what’s wrong.

Moreover, Ozanam’s insistence that the Church align with the cry of the poor is a message that resonates with the vision of Pope Francis and many young Catholics today. Long before concepts like the “preferential option for the poor” were articulated, Ozanam was living it. He understood that charity must lead to justice – addressing root causes of poverty. Young social justice advocates in the Church today can find in him a mentor who straddled charity and advocacy.

Finally, Ozanam’s approach to political ideals (liberty, equality, fraternity) shows how we can inculturate Gospel values in secular language. He effectively baptized those Enlightenment ideals by interpreting them through a Christian lens. Young Catholics can similarly engage contemporary movements for human rights, environmental stewardship, racial equality, etc., by finding the authentic Gospel values within them and working alongside others to realize those, while gently steering conversations to deeper truths about God and human dignity. Ozanam did not fear the modern world; he sought to evangelize it from within, respecting what was good in it. That dynamic equilibrium – fidelity to unchanging truths and openness to change in society – is precisely what the Church asks of laypeople, especially the youth who are often in the vanguard of social movements. In Frédéric Ozanam, we see a man who managed to be both a man of his revolutionary age and a man of the eternal Church, showing that one can be fully modern and fully Christian, working to transform the world in Christ’s spirit.