ACTION FRANÇAISE. — A politico-social movement that arose in France in 1899 on the initiative of Henry Vaugeois. Charles Maurras became its principal theorist, following in the footsteps of the master of French positivism, Auguste Comte. The movement gained many adherents, including Catholics. Surviving various complex vicissitudes, under the leadership of Léon Daudet and Charles Maurras, it achieved considerable resonance in French and foreign politico-social thought and action. Instruments of its expansion were the works of Maurras and Daudet and the Revue d'A.F., which later became the daily newspaper L'A.F. (1908).
The movement’s political program, which in time rose to become that of a genuine party, was and remained thoroughly French: the restoration of the monarchy in France. The struggle to implement this program, however, came to assume more universal characteristics: the exaltation of an “integral nationalism” and the overturning of contemporary political and social life by every means and in defiance of every limitation, even to the point of adopting boldly revolutionary attitudes. Alongside the innovative political movement and the party stood the philosophical-social system that inspired principles and doctrines far more daring and dangerous. The movement’s theorists, led by Maurras—raised as a Christian but later becoming an unbeliever—and Daudet—a believer but a highly unconventional novelist—willingly drew inspiration from “positivist” theories. It is therefore no wonder that in the background of the doctrines of A. F. we find a decidedly atheistic and anti-Christian agnosticism, an openly pagan naturalism, and consequently an unmistakable amoralism, both of the individual and of society, with the resulting removal of the individual and society from the influence of the law of God and the Church. The proclaimed subordination of morality and law to the national interest is explained precisely against the background of such doctrines.
It was evident that membership in the movement under the influence of such doctrines constituted a grave danger to the faith. Yet many French Catholics, including senior members of the clergy, failed to recognize this, attracted by the merits that A. F. might have acquired indirectly in the struggle against the persecutors of the Church, and dazzled by the professions of absolute respect for religion and for the beliefs of individual adherents that flowed from the pens of the “masters.” Hence the serious equivocation and the no less serious illusion that were gradually taking hold in the souls of the many Catholics who, perhaps in the majority, had joined the movement or even the party. But the gravest danger and the most deplorable illusion threatened the young, and not only those in France.
Danger, equivocation, and illusion soon gave rise to controversies between the opposing tendencies of those who denounced them and those who denied or exaggerated them, turning instead to the opposing and equally false democratic or demagogical ideas; cf. P. Descoq, A travers l'oeuvre de M. Ch. Maurras, in Etudes, 120 (1909, III), pp. 153-86, 330-46, 593-641 and 121 (1909, IV), pp. 602-28, articles later reprinted, with revisions and additions, under the same title, Paris 1913; P. Exupère de Prats-De-Molle, A propos de la politique religieuse de Ch. Maurras, in Etudes Franciscaines, 29 (1913, I), p. 520 ff.; F. Chalanave, L'A. F. Ses Principes, ses Directions et son Institut, Etude documentaire, Paris n. d.; and still other publications of the same kind that appeared in journals or pamphlets up to 1927, thus becoming part of the well-known analogous controversy surrounding the Sillon, which ended with the condemnation by Pope Pius X.
The episode reported by F. X. Maquart, L'A. F. devant le Souverain Pontife, in Pourquoi Rome a parlé, IV, Paris 1927, p. 257, is revealing: “The notebooks of the Association of Belgian Catholic Youth, having organized in 1925 a referendum on the following subject: Among the writers of the last twenty-five years, whom do you regard as your masters? — the greatest number of votes went to Charles Maurras, whereas Cardinal Mercier obtained only the last place, with just six votes.”
For these reasons the authorities of the Church, taking every care, as always, not to interfere in the merely political program of A. F., disapproved and condemned its errors from the moral and religious point of view. The condemnation had been decreed and ready as early as 1914; but its publication had been deferred “until a more propitious time.” This chronological reminder is important, because it demolishes the equivocal thesis of A. F., which tended to set Pius XI against his predecessor Pius X.
Moreover, the documents issued in this regard by the French episcopate, as well as by Pope Pius XI and the various dicasteries of the Roman Curia, beginning in 1926, are well known (cf. the AAS and the principal Catholic journals from 1926 to 1929). Also interesting are the marginal documents reproduced by F. X. Maquart (loc. cit.), because they demonstrate with what patience, prudence, and paternal solicitude the Pope acted in so complex and thorny a matter. In the meantime Pius XI had to re-examine the whole question personally, since he had been unable to obtain the dossier, lost during the removal of the archives of the Index. But his conclusions entirely conformed to those of 1914. This is how he expressed himself in a letter to Cardinal Andrieu, archbishop of Bordeaux, on 5 January 1927 (La documentation catholique, 17 [1927], col. 139 ff.):
“It is altogether evident that We would have employed entirely different procedures if the documents We are publishing had been known to Us; but We did not receive them until after the day of the Consistory. It was certainly very painful for Us to see the name and alleged conduct of Our revered Predecessor set against Our name and Our conduct with regard to A. F. (as has so often been done, more or less openly); We had the profound feeling, or rather the presentiment, not to say something more, that such an opposition did not correspond to the truth . . . but the positive documents were lacking; they were lacking to Us until the very last hour . . . They attest to the Church’s persevering judgment on this grave question. We hope that, now that it has been revealed, such continuity in the supreme judgment of this Church, which the Holy Spirit calls calumne et firmamentum variata, would in itself suffice to enlighten minds, dispel doubts, reassure souls, and restore peace everywhere and in all.”
In painful contrast was the attitude of open insubordination assumed by the movement’s leaders, who did not hesitate to publish a purported yellow book in reply to the Vatican (cf. Les pièces d'un procès. L'A. F. et le Vatican, with a preface by Charles Maurras and Léon Daudet, Paris 1927; as well as the exhaustive commentary on it in La Civiltà Cattolica, [1927, III, p. 329 ff.]). A. F. responded with the proud non possumus and launched a campaign of virulent anticlericalism. More formal and more serious condemnations then followed, both from the S. Congregation of the Holy Office, concerning the doctrinal system not only of the movement but also of the newspaper itself and the leagues, and from the S. Penitentiary, concerning the interdict and the refusal of absolution to the rebels. It is interesting to note that the heads of the French royal house themselves were in turn compelled to disavow A. F. Later there was a praiseworthy recantation. As early as 1938, the movement’s leaders had appealed to Pope Pius XI to obtain the withdrawal of the condemnation. The petition was repeated, with a sincere retraction and guarantees for the future, in 1939, to Pope Pius XII, who accepted and granted it (cf. the AAS and the principal Catholic journals of 1939).
La lettera del 19 giugno 1939 dell'A. F. al papa Pio XII diceva, fra l'altro: « Nous exprimons la plus sincère tristesse de ce qui a été de notre part irrespectueux, injurieux, et même injuste envers la Personne du Pape, envers le S. Siège et la Hiérarchie Ecclesiastique... Tous ceux d'entre nous, qui sont catholiques, rejettent complètement tout principe et toute théorie contraire aux enseignements de l'Eglise Catholique...».
Bisogna però tener presente che la misura di clemenza di Pio XII riguardo all'A. F. dopo ripetuti atti di resipiscenza, concerne soltanto il giornale omonimo, lasciando evidentemente sussistere la condanna delle opere del Maurras e del Daudet elencate nel libro dell'Indice.