Jean Ousset (28 July 1914 – 20 April 1994) was a French ideologist of

National Catholicism National Catholicism ( Spanish: ''nacionalcatolicismo'') was part of the ideological identity of Francoism, the political system through which the Spanish dictator Francisco Franco governed the Spanish State between 1939 and 1975. Its most vi ...

born in

Porto Porto or Oporto () is the second-largest city in Portugal, the capital of the Porto District, and one of the Iberian Peninsula's major urban areas. Porto city proper, which is the entire municipality of Porto, is small compared to its metropol ...

Portugal Portugal, officially the Portuguese Republic ( pt, República Portuguesa, links=yes ), is a country whose mainland is located on the Iberian Peninsula of Southwestern Europe, and whose territory also includes the Atlantic archipelagos of ...

. He was an activist of the ''

Action française Action may refer to: * Action (narrative), a literary mode * Action fiction, a type of genre fiction * Action game, a genre of video game Film * Action film, a genre of film * ''Action'' (1921 film), a film by John Ford * ''Action'' (1980 fil ...

'' monarchist movement in the 1930s, and personal secretary of its leader,

Charles Maurras Charles-Marie-Photius Maurras (; ; 20 April 1868 – 16 November 1952) was a French author, politician, poet, and critic. He was an organizer and principal philosopher of ''Action Française'', a political movement that is monarchist, anti-par ...

. Under the

Vichy regime Vichy France (french: Régime de Vichy; 10 July 1940 – 9 August 1944), officially the French State ('), was the fascist French state headed by Marshal Philippe Pétain during World War II. Officially independent, but with half of its ter ...

during

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposing ...

, Ousset became the chief of the research bureau of ''Jeune légion'', a structure dependent of the '' Légion française des combattants'', the veterans' association created in 1940 and headed by

Xavier Vallat Xavier Vallat (December 23, 1891 – January 6, 1972), French politician and antisemite who was Commissioner-General for Jewish Questions in the wartime Vichy collaborationist government, and was sentenced after World War II to ten years in pr ...

. Following the Liberation, Jean Ousset became one of the leaders of Cité catholique, an

integral In mathematics, an integral assigns numbers to functions in a way that describes displacement, area, volume, and other concepts that arise by combining infinitesimal data. The process of finding integrals is called integration. Along wit ...

Catholic The Catholic Church, also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the largest Christian church, with 1.3 billion baptized Catholics worldwide . It is among the world's oldest and largest international institutions, and has played a ...

group. The Cité catholique also included

Marcel Lefebvre Marcel François Marie Joseph Lefebvre (; 29 November 1905 – 25 March 1991) was a French Catholic archbishop who greatly influenced modern traditional Catholicism. In 1970, he founded the Society of Saint Pius X (SSPX), a community to tra ...

, who later founded the priestly Society of St. Pius X, free from neo-modernist and indifferentist currents. As the

Cagoule A cagoule (), also spelled cagoul, kagoule or kagool, is the British English term for a lightweight weatherproof raincoat or anorak with a hood (usually without lining), which often comes in knee-length form.The Chambers Dictionary, 1994, The Ca ...

had done before the war, the Cité catholique had as aim to infiltrate the Republic's elites in order to form a National Catholic state, on the model of

Francoist Spain Francoist Spain ( es, España franquista), or the Francoist dictatorship (), was the period of Spanish history between 1939 and 1975, when Francisco Franco ruled Spain after the Spanish Civil War with the title . After his death in 1975, Spai ...

. Jean Ousset published in 1949 ''Pour qu'Il règne'' ("That He may reign"), a title which later chosen by the Belgian section of the Society of St. Pius X as the title of its newspaper. The preface of the book was signed by

. Ousset also wrote ''Le Marxisme-Léninisme'' in which he developed the new concept of " subversion" and argued that Marxists could only be combatted by "a profound faith, an unlimited obedience to the Holy Father, and a thorough knowledge of the Church's doctrines.".Quoted by

Horacio Verbitsky Horacio Verbitsky (born February 11, 1942) is an Argentine investigative journalist and author with a history as a leftist guerrilla in the Montoneros. In the early 1990s, he reported on a series corruption scandals in the administration of Pre ...

in ''The Silence'', extract transl. in English made available by

openDemocracy openDemocracy is an independent media platform and news website based in the United Kingdom. Founded in 2001, openDemocracy states that through reporting and analysis of social and political issues, they seek to "challenge power and encourage de ...

Breaking the silence: the Catholic Church in Argentina and the "dirty war"
, July 28, 2005 Its Spanish translation was prefaced by Antonio Caggiano, the archbishop of Buenos Aires and military chaplain, who would theorize counter-revolutionary warfare in Argentina (theories which were implemented by the military during the so-called "

Dirty War The Dirty War ( es, Guerra sucia) is the name used by the military junta or civic-military dictatorship of Argentina ( es, dictadura cívico-militar de Argentina, links=no) for the period of state terrorism in Argentina from 1974 to 1983 as ...

"). One of his most significant works (the only one translated into English), ''

Action Action may refer to: * Action (narrative), a literary mode * Action fiction, a type of genre fiction * Action game, a genre of video game Film * Action film, a genre of film * ''Action'' (1921 film), a film by John Ford * ''Action'' (1980 fil ...

'' is a handbook designed as a practical implementation of the Social Teachings of the Catholic Church in alignment with the papal encyclicals that call for a re-establishment the Social Kingship of Christ. The work provides a structured approach to social involvement and response to anti-Catholic movements. The English translation of ''Action'' was introduced by Anthony Fraser, son of Hamish Fraser the noted founder of the journal ''Approaches'', convert to Catholicism from atheistic Communism and the producer of the English translation of this work.

Works

*''Histoire et génie de la France'' (1943) *''Fondement d’une doctrine'' (1944) *''Pour qu'Il règne'' (1949) *
Action
' (~1959) *
To Fly from the Cross: A History of Dark Disorder in the Catholic Church
'

Works

References

Further reading

See also