Frédéric and Amélie Ozanam

Abstract

This chapter explores the relationship between the believing Catholic and the wider community by focusing on Frédéric and Amélie Ozanam. Frédéric Ozanam, the founder of the lay Catholic charitable Society of Saint Vincent de Paul, was a prominent Catholic republican in 1848 when he articulated a Christian response to the social question. The Society of Saint Vincent de Paul grew out of his desire to remain connected to the world of bachelor male friends, but as this chapter shows, marriage to Amélie Soulacroix transformed Ozanam's sense of his obligations and led him to reconsider his rapport with the society in which he lived. The chapter also discusses Ozanam's views on charity and social justice in relation to the Catholic Church, his concept of a Catholic social, and his role in fin de siècle social Catholicism.