Society of Catholic Worker Circles

The Society of Catholic Worker Circles (French: L'Oeuvre des Cercles Catholiques d'Ouvriers) is an association created in 1871 by Count Albert de Mun, one of the founders of the magazine monarchist legitimist named the Catholic Association. The association also included among its founders and leaders René de la Tour du Pin, Félix de Roquefeuil and Maurice Maignen. These Social Reformers wanted to re-Christianize the people and contribute to the defense of its moral and material interests, to prevent another tragedy like the Paris Commune.

Sensitive to the "social question", they wee aware of the seriousness of the responsibilities of the elite to which they belong and wanted "to work to fill the resentment which separated the social classes" since the development of industrial civilization and economic liberalism. They saw in these "circles where men of privileged classes meet Christian workers and make lasting friendships with them", the instrument of this social regeneration that they hope for.

History

Origins

In 1865, the "Association of Young Workers", founded by Maurice Maignen in 1855, became the "Circle of Young Workers", better known as "Circle Montparnasse", located at 126 boulevard du Montparnasse.

Albert de Mun was directly inspired by Maurice Maignen and his circle when, the day after the repression of the Commune, he launched into social action, convinced that such tragedies could only be avoided if the ruling class devoted itself to the working class. Maignen, as Albert de Mun says in his book Ma vocation sociale ("My social vocation"), "no longer asked for alms, he taught love, and he ordered dedication". He therefore decided to multiply the experience of circles and, on 23 December 1871, created, with Maurice Maignen and René de la Tour du Pin, the Society of Catholic Worker Circles.

The example of the Montparnasse circle was immediately imitated: the first was inaugurated on April 7, 1872 in Belleville, then it was in Montmartre that another similar circle was organized and the movement reached the province.

In August 1872, the first Lyonese circle was inaugurated, in the district where the Canut revolts occurred, the Croix-Rousse. The circle included many notables of the clergy, the judiciary, and the military. In the second and third circles that started shortly thereafter, the presence of officers became less conspicuous.

Also established in Bordeaux in 1872, the Society had two circles, that of the parish of Saint-Seurin, founded in December 1872 (192 members one year later), and that of Saint-Nicolas, inaugurated on April 20, 1873, with 140 members (94 only in December 1873). In 1875, a third circle was studied, it was finally inaugurated on August 26, 1876, it was the circle of Chartrons.

By 1878, the association in France grew to a total of 375 clubs, 37,500 workers and 7,600 members of the ruling classes. In Lyon, the circles survived until the early 1930s.

External links

• http://gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/bpt6k5500174v Instruction sur l'oeuvre / Oeuvre des cercles catholiques d'ouvriers (1887)