TFP Student Action Europe - Statement of Purpose
In Defense of the Highest Interests of the Catholic Cause and Christian Civilisation
TFP Student Action-Europe is launched. It aims to affirm, disseminate and defend Catholic principles not only from student to student, but from students to families and society.
This Statement of Purpose, which defines the scope of TFP Student Action-Europe, is addressed to young university students in general and to Catholic students in particular. Those who welcome it with sympathy are fully aware that the world is going through a decisive moment. Those who are sceptical, indifferent or atheistic will naturally receive it with coldness, but might be even more aware than believers that this is a decisive moment in which people’s convictions oscillate between two extremes, error and truth. Such is the present situation of civilisation.
We embrace the dogmas of the Holy Catholic Church in their fullness
A panoramic view of what is happening on the European continent gives us the inescapable conviction that it is no longer possible to live in the regime of separation between religious conscience and civic conscience as if the latter should not be inspired by the former; between academic conscience and religious conscience; between a professor’s conscience and that of a faithful Catholic; between the conscience of those that govern and that of those who ought who ought to be self-ruled, as if social life were not affected by abandoning the immortal principles that have oriented humanity so far.
Unfortunately, Europe took the path towards evil ever since an exaggerated separation between Church and State turned into a dangerous prejudice against Catholicism.
For decades, the ill-fated prejudice that a good citizen is one educated in destructive secularism, who defends it in public life, has caused Catholicism to be removed from the consciences of citizens and rulers.
This is the cause of the almost complete dissolution of moral values and customs, and the loss of Christian identity, paving the way for all forms of violations of the Natural and Divine Law such as the legalization of abortion, euthanasia and homosexual relations, as well as the spread of gender ideology even to primary schools.
Facing today’s catastrophic, de-natured and threatening panorama, our Catholic consciences rise up in face of the disgraceful cowardice and disillusionment in all sectors of social life. Therefore, supported on the centuries-old authority of the Holy Catholic Church, TFP Student Action-Europe declares that it embraces all her dogmas in their fullness, without any restriction; and that it will never tread any path other than the Catholic Faith.
Our Goal: Defend the Christian Order
TFP Student Action-Europe demonstrates with consistent and unequivocal actions that the institutions of tradition, family and property are the backbone of every society seeking to grow toward a Christian order in a Christian state. Therefore, wherever it finds misconceptions or distorted truths, TFP Student Action-Europe will strongly defend truth and fight error.
We have in mind especially those youth whose indifferentism we will strive to overcome. We also combat those who call themselves Catholics but who coexist with today’s neo-pagan and anti-Christian spirit. We have neither pessimism nor fear of sacrifice, evil trends that beset many good Catholic-educated young men. Their moral reserves must be set in motion, for either we are fully Catholic or are ties uniting Catholicism to the modern world.
We will fight for good ideas against bad ones. We are not fighting people, but ideas.
Conclusion
With this Statement of Purpose, TFP Student Action-Europe aims to draw the attention of lukewarm youths to the fact they are conniving with an ambience of idealistic illusions; that of Catholic university students who have not yet decided to act, so they finally take a stand; and of those ready to fight, to adhere to TFP Student Action-Europe.
We are not alone. We hold fast to the perennial principles that guide our spiritual formation. We stand with religion, against which, men’s errors and pride have never prevailed. We therefore stand for the highest interests of the Catholic Cause and of Christian Civilisation.
We make our own the words of Prof Plinio Corrêa de Oliveira—founder of the Brazilian Society for the Defense of Tradition, Family and Property and inspirer of 28 TFPs and sister associations on five continents:
“In times of great crisis there are two types of men: those who are overwhelmed by the crisis and those who rise up to resist the trend of events and so change the course of history.”
Which type of man will you be?
TFP Student Action Europe