Prof. Stephen Kelly, Head of the School of Humanities and author of A Conservative at Heart? The Political and Social Thought of John Henry Newman (Dublin, 2012), reflects on his subject's recent proclamation as 'Doctor of the Church'.
Last week, writes Prof. Stephen Kelly, St. John Henry Newman was proclaimed a ‘Doctor of the Church’ during a Mass celebrated in Saint Peter’s Square in the Vatican on the Feast of All Saints.
This title of ‘Doctor of the Church’ is rarely bestowed. St. John Henry Newman is now only one of thirty-eight to have received this honour. Others include St. Augustine and St. Thérèse, alongside one of Newman’s great religious heroes, St.
Thomas Aquinas.
"[The title of Doctor of the Church] is conferred on those who have made a very significant contribution to an understanding of the faith through their insights, through their work, through their preaching and teaching, and St. John Henry Newman was certainly a case in point", explains Bishop Fintan Monahan of Killaloe, Ireland.
In a recent apostolic letter on education, Pope Leo also declared St. John Henry Newman as a patron saint of the Catholic Church's educational mission. St. John Henry Newman, who was declared Venerable by Pope Saint John Paul II in 1991, Beatified by Pope Benedict XVI in 2010, and Canonised by Pope Francis in 2019, has a strong educational connection to Liverpool Hope University.
Indeed, Newman stands as a Victorian giant in the field of theology, philosophy and education. Influencing numerous academic and spiritual disciplines, Newman’s writings and his lifelong search for religious truth continue to inspire scholars
worldwide. Liverpool Hope University aims to enhance and extend the reach of Newman’s life and spirituality.
The Gradwell collection, housed in Hope’s Library (see https://archives.hope.ac.uk/records/GRAD), contains a generous corpus of Newman’s own published works (including first editions) and books on or related to Newman. This scholarly resource is complemented by the availability of a recently updated, extensive collection of Newman-related publications from the main Sheppard-Worlock Library collection.
The collection also includes, preserved on microfilm, the Personal Papers of John Henry Newman (see https://archives.hope.ac.uk/records/JHN/PER), which contains copies of the letters, diaries and miscellaneous papers of John Henry Newman originally archived at the Oratory of St. Philip Neri. On the subject of Newman’s educational thought, particularly his idea of Liberal Knowledge, modern educationalists and third-level institutions worldwide remain indebted to his vision.
Today, there is hardly a humanist educator who has failed to quote the significance of Newman’s idea of Liberal Knowledge.
The mania for specialisation at university level, with its consequent result of narrow-mindedness and inability to communicate with those not of the same intellectual discipline, has led to a greater awareness of the necessity for a liberal education, which Newman so skillfully portrayed.
By Liberal Knowledge, Newman did not mean an acceptance of the emerging 19th-century liberal educational philosophy of Utilitarianism. Instead, his use of “liberal” was far more ancient; it denoted a commitment to the philosophy and ethos of the
historical ”liberalism” of European cultural tradition.
For Newman, liberal education entailed an education in which knowledge was sought for its own sake, rather than for any benefits that might be derived from it. This did not mean he viewed Liberal Knowledge as its own end, as “implying a total
expulsion of religion and morality from higher education.”
On the contrary, Newman believed that Liberal Knowledge had an essential objective in the field of higher education.
Newman’s idea of Liberal Knowledge, as defined in his seminal publication The Idea of a University (1852) and put into practice during his rectorship of the Catholic University of Ireland (CUI) from 1851 to 1858, was to get the balance right between a liberal education, which would prepare good members of society, and a utilitarian training, which would provide experts skilled in their professions.
Through The Idea of a University, particularly Discourses V, VI and VII, Newman articulated eloquently his idea of Liberal Knowledge, both from a philosophical and practical standpoint.
He spoke of his “exhaustion” in composing his Discourses; while he may have very well been physically and mentally worn out by his Irish mission, it proved a worthwhile exercise.
His idea of Liberal Knowledge was, therefore, what one would today call “general knowledge,” conceived of as a preliminary both to professional training and to civic life. Despite the fact that all writings become dated, Newman’s views should not be
dismissed. Newman scholars agree that the doctrine of Liberal Knowledge is Newman’s most important contribution to the theory of higher education. Ineed, Newman’s rectorship of the CUI ushered in some examples of forward-thinking on the subject of higher education.
Although Newman envisaged that the CUI would follow the medieval tradition, with four faculties consisting of arts, medicine, law and theology, under his guidance, the university was to the forefront of European academic advancement.
At the CUI, he founded chairs of Political and Social Science, Political Economy, and Geography.
Additionally, Newman founded one of the first chairs of English Literature in the British Isles, to which he added a chair of Poetry; indeed, the CUI was one year ahead of Oxford University in founding a Chair of English Literature. He urged the establishment of an Engineering School, despite the difficulty of combining academic residence with the practical studies of the experience in field work which the sciences required. Not only that, but Newman was one of the earliest exponents of the laity securing prominent academic and administrative positions at the CUI. He wanted a layman to be appointed as vice-rector and requested that a lay committee be employed to administer and supervise the university’s finances.
Arguably, Newman’s most important educational advancement was the foundation of the Medical School at the CUI. He wrote that its importance was not simply a question of producing qualified doctors, but of “securing the moral and liberal
education of the Medical Profession, a profession which can, of all others, be an aid and support to parish priests in the country at large.”
Essentially, Newman held an appreciation for what was worth preserving from the traditions of the older universities, together with an awareness of what needed to be inaugurated in response to the requirements of contemporary society. In the words of Michael Tierney, Newman’s mission to Ireland established a new type of university which, “while drawing upon the lessons of the past, would at the same time be capable of meeting the challenge of the present and future.”