“So long Thy power hath blest me, sure it still / Will lead me on”

John Henry Newman

ARTICLES

“A Rhetoric in Conduct”: The Gentleman of the University and the Gentleman of the Oratory

M. Katherine Tillman

Newman’s explicit presentation of the ideal type, “the gentleman,” appears first and foremost in his Oratory papers of 1847 and 1848, and appears only secondarily, and then but partially, four and five years later in his Dublin Discourses of 1852 (The Idea of a University). This essay traces lines of similarity and of difference between these successive portraits and distinguishes both from the attractive, better-known sketch Newman presents as Lord Shaftesbury’s, the “beau ideal” of the man of the world.

Katherine Tillman, professor emerita of the Program of Liberal Studies at the University of Notre Dame, has taught, lectured, and published extensively on Newman, including introductions to his Rise and Progress of Universities and Benedictine Essays and to his Fifteen Sermons Preached Before the University of Oxford.  An earlier version of this essay was the featured address at the 2007 conference of the Venerable John Henry Newman Association at the National Institute for Newman Studies in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.

Newman and Natural Theology

Patrick J. Fletcher

Although the second and third University Discourses in Newman’s Idea of a University are well known for according theology a place in a university education by showing the relationship of theology to the other sciences, this essay points out that Newman was also arguing against the “natural theology” of British thinkers like William Paley, Lord Brougham, Sir Robert Peel, and Bishop Edward Maltby, who maintained that the study of the natural sciences would necessarily lead to religion; Newman objected that this kind of “natural theology”  could  easily lead to deism or pantheism.

Patrick J. Fletcher is a doctoral student in systematic theology at The Catholic University of America, Washington, DC.

Religious Liberty in the University: Reflections on Newman’s Loss And Gain

Bernadette Waterman Ward

This essay—originally a presentation at a symposium on “The Idea of a University in the Third Millennium: Revisiting Newman’s Vision of the Academy” at McNeese State University, Lake Charles, Louisiana, February 15–16, 2008—reflects on intellectual freedom and religious commitment at modern American universities in light of Newman’s novel Loss and Gain.

Bernadette Waterman Ward is Associate Professor of English at the University of Dallas (Texas).  

Newman’s Theology and Practice of Fasting as an Anglican

Daniel J. Lattier

This essay examines the role that fasting played in Newman’s spirituality as an Anglican: [1] the intellectual, spiritual, and historical factors that led Newman to concentrate on this ascetical practice; [2] his theology of fasting as it appears in his Parochial and Plain Sermons and his Letters and Diaries; and [3] the role of fasting in his personal spiritual journey.   

Daniel J. Lattier, a doctoral student in Theology at Duquesne University, Pittsburgh, PA.,  would like to thank Fr. Drew Morgan, CO, and Dr. Don Briel for their helpful comments on an earlier draft of this essay.

SERMON STUDIES

“Calculated To Undermine Things Established”: Newman’s Fourteenth Oxford University Sermon

David Delio

This sermon study shows how Newman’s concerns about utilitarianism—previously expressed in his series of letters on “The Tamworth Reading Room”—and his advocacy of the compatibility of Anglican and Roman Catholic doctrines—previously enunciated in Tract 90—are revisited in his fourteenth Oxford University Sermon.

David Delio is a doctoral student in systematic theology at The Catholic University of America, Washington, DC.

BOOK REVIEWS

Joseph Linck reviewing: Pamela J. Gilbert, This Restless Prelate: Bishop Peter Baines   

Hal Weidner reviewing: Stephen Tomkins, William Wilberforce: A Biography

Peter Stravinskas reviewing: Milton Walsh, Ronald Knox as Apologist: Wit, Laughter and the Popish Creed

John Griffin reviewing: Robin Wheeler, Palmer's Pilgrimage: The Life of William Palmer of Magdalen

BIBLIOGRAPHY

NEWMAN CHRONOLOGY