The Cause of the Canonisation of John Henry Cardinal Newman

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Papers given at the Milan Conference: Newman on Faith and Reason, the friendship of the Human and the Divine

Categorised as News and published Tuesday, March 31st, 2009
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Apse Mosaic in the Church of S. Ambrose, Milan. The Baldacchino (canopy) to the right stands over the shrine of S. Ambrose

Below we publish short notes on each of the main papers delivered at the Conference John Henry Newman oggi: logos e dialogo, which was held in Milan on 26-27 March:

In the opening paper of the Conference Revd Dr Jeremy Morris, Dean of Trinity Hall, Cambridge, examined Newman’s relations to other nineteenth century English thinkers, and reflected on the Anglican Newman’s developing theology of the Church. Dr Morris suggested that in Newman’s Letter to Pusey he anticipated modern ecumenical endeavour, avoiding polemic in favour of an honest analysis of doctrine and ecclesial practice.

Father Ian Ker, of the University of Oxford, offered a powerful analysis of Newman’s doctrine of conscience, arguing that his celebrated maxim that he would drink “to Conscience first, and to the Pope afterwards” refers to the possibility of acting against a papal order in certain limited cases, and gives no support to Catholics who choose to dissent from a moral or doctrinal teaching of the Church.

Father Ian Ker

Father Michael Paul Gallagher, of the Gregorian University in Rome, identified points of contact between Newman and the Jesuit theologian Bernard Lonergan, emphasising that both thinkers advocate a conception of reason in which “truth” is not divorced from “values”. The path to religious belief, for both Newman and Lonergan, requires a “preparation of heart”, a movement of the whole person towards God.

Professor Fortunato Morrone, of the Theological Institute of Calabria, drew on Newman’s Grammar of Assent to unfold a vision of the relationship between faith and reason as ‘friendship’, in which each helps the other in a dynamic of mutual assistance.

Giving the first paper on the second day of the Conference, Professor Roman Siebenrock, from the Catholic Faculty of Theology at Innsbruck, reflected on how the teachings of the Second Vatican Council could be regarded as “authentic developments” according to the criteria laid down in Newman’s Essay on the Development of Christian Doctrine. Prof Siebenrock concluded that in new formulations of doctrine found in the documents of the Council, such as the teaching that the Church is the “universal sacrament of salvation”, the validity of Newman’s theory of development is both recognised and exemplified.

Father Dermot Fenlon, of the University of Birmingham, and a member of Cardinal Newman’s Birmingham Oratory, spoke about Newman’s influence in Germany in the first part of the twentieth century, and how through one of his principal translators, Theodor Haecker, Newman’s writings made an impact on the student ‘White Rose’ group, a non-violent movement of resistance against the Nazi Regime. From the basis of Newman’s doctrine of Conscience, Haecker argued that true political resistance must include obedience to God and his will. Here, we see Newman’s special contribution to political and social life: in an age of apostasy, he speaks of the ‘still, small voice’ of God.

Professor Michele Marchetto, from the International School of Professional Formation at Venice, spoke about Newman and relativism, drawing attention to his emphasis on the “objectivity” of religious truth – the truth is not invented by us, but something discovered and received; but at the same time, for Newman truth is authentically “subjective” – because the way religious truth is received depends on the person, and is inseparable from that person. Such “subjectivity” isn’t the same as relativism, argued Marchetto, but rather an acknowledgement of the human and personal aspect essential to faith.

Monsignor Inos Biffi spoke on Newman and the Fathers of the Church, strikingly quoting Newman’s words: “The Fathers made me a Catholic, and I am not going to kick down the ladder by which I ascended into the Church.” At the same time, Biffi stressed how Newman’s close reading of the Fathers made him think of them “not as past figures lost to us for ever, but as his true contemporaries”. Biffi also noted Newman’s love for Milan, the “City of St. Ambrose”.

Father Graziano Borgonovo reflected upon the formation of “new witnesses” to Christianity in a secularised age, and emphasised Newman’s doctrine of the importance of personal formation.  Borgonovo argued that, for Newman, the full range of contemporary understandings of the world and of the human condition can become instruments to aid the contemporary believer in witnessing to Christ’s message. Yet, for the Christian (as even for the non-Christian, in Newman’s vision) God must have the central place: “Religious Truth is not only a portion, but a condition of general knowledge“.

Summaries in Italian available here (leaves site)