New Doctor!
  • monasteryliturgistmonasteryliturgist
    Posts: 520
    Il 31 luglio 2025, il Santo Padre Leone XIV ha ricevuto in udienza Sua Eminenza Reverendissima il Signor Cardinale Marcello Semeraro, Prefetto del Dicastero delle Cause dei Santi.

    Nel corso della stessa udienza il Santo Padre ha confermato il parere affermativo della Sessione Plenaria dei Cardinali e Vescovi, Membri del Dicastero delle Cause dei Santi, circa il titolo di Dottore della Chiesa Universale che sarà prossimamente conferito a San John Henry Newman, Cardinale di Santa Romana Chiesa, Fondatore dell’Oratorio di San Filippo Neri in Inghilterra; nato a Londra (Regno Unito) il 21 febbraio 1801 e morto a Edgbaston (Regno Unito) l’11 agosto 1890.

    https://press.vatican.va/content/salastampa/it/bollettino/pubblico/2025/07/31/0534/00956.html

    On July 31, 2025, the Holy Father Leo XIV received in audience His Most Reverend Eminence Cardinal Marcello Semeraro, Prefect of the Dicastery for the Causes of Saints.

    In the course of the same audience, the Holy Father confirmed the favorable opinion of the Plenary Session of the Cardinals and Bishops, Members of the Dicastery for the Causes of Saints, regarding the title of Doctor of the Universal Church, which will soon be conferred upon Saint John Henry Newman, Cardinal of the Holy Roman Church, Founder of the Oratory of Saint Philip Neri in England; born in London (United Kingdom) on February 21, 1801, and died in Edgbaston (United Kingdom) on August 11, 1890.
    Thanked by 2Anna_Bendiksen CHGiffen
  • RMSawicki
    Posts: 142
    DEO GRATIAS!

    I can only hope St. Philip Neri and St. John Paul II are, at the very least, "on deck"?

    Gaudete in Domino Semper!
    Thanked by 1monasteryliturgist
  • trentonjconn
    Posts: 785
    Te Deums will be sung in the Ordinariate this Sunday!
    Thanked by 6monasteryliturgist M. Jackson Osborn Chrism CHGiffen LauraKaz Anna_Bendiksen
  • monasteryliturgistmonasteryliturgist
    Posts: 520
    @RMSawicki

    I have not heard anything about St. Philip Neri but I do know that proposals were made to the dicastery for John Paul II as well as Teresa Benedicta!
    Thanked by 1kenstb
  • Chant_Supremacist
    Posts: 267
    I’m not very familiar with his contributions. I’ve read some selections on his ideas anbout doctrinal development, and parts of his ‘Idea of a University.’ Are there any things that stand out as reasons for his being declared a Doctor of the Church?
  • Kathy
    Posts: 5,524
    A Grammar of Assent might be a place to start reading. But there are many facets to this gem.
    Thanked by 2Chant_Supremacist IanW
  • monasteryliturgistmonasteryliturgist
    Posts: 520
    I read somewhere that one of the proposed titles was "doctor of conscience". But I dont know much about his theological works, I have only read mostly homilies and meditations.
  • RoborgelmeisterRoborgelmeister
    Posts: 328
    It has been said that the spirit of Newman was hovering over Vatican II.
  • Anna_BendiksenAnna_Bendiksen
    Posts: 274
    I think this is the place to post a bit of doggerel that I penned back when St. John Henry was canonized. If one is in the right mood, it can be sung to "Adoro te devote."

    1. Saint John Henry Newman, wise and dreaming heart,
    Would not be contented with a landsman's part;
    Soul in punt from Oxford for the rock of Rome,
    He sought Heaven's kingdom; now he calls it home.

    2. Mark how this meek captain, clinging to the Cross
    Through a storm of insults, enmity, and loss,
    Hailed his prize so gladly that a myriad more
    Kindred sailors followed, new men on that shore.

    3. Captivating sirens lure to depths of ill;
    To the rock of Peter dreamers voyage still;
    From the Word incarnate, lantern in the night,
    Goodness, truth, and beauty buoy with kindly light.

    4. Cardinal and poet, oceanic mind,
    Led to nave eternal by that Light most kind:
    Pray we may be always true to Christ's own chart,
    Bound in traverse holy to His Sacred Heart.

    (c) 2019 Anna Bendiksen
    Thanked by 5CHGiffen M. Jackson Osborn monasteryliturgist Rocinante irishtenor
  • David Sullivan
    Posts: 363
    Dottore subito!!

    Today's , August 4, Nat Catholic Register has a discussion on St John Henry's new title. Here are some reasons for naming him a Doctor of the Church.

    Father Harrison--an Oratorian who's one of the official promoters of Newman's cause--pinpointed five key teachings of Newman, which he believes have most relevance to the modern world:

    His insight into the development of doctrine — “that things have to change in order to remain the same, paradoxically, that their expression has to change;”

    Newman’s ideas on education, that it “is for life and for the afterlife, not just about league tables and passing exams;”

    His belief in the primacy of conscience as “being the still small voice of God within us;”

    HIs conviction that science and religion, if true, “both come from the same source of truth, God himself, so they are not in conflict, but can and should work together;”

    And that the laity is “not supplementary” but “crucial to the very foundation of the Church, and that he wanted an informed, and well-educated laity for the Church's mission.”

    The entire article is at National Catholic Register.
    Thanked by 3IanW CHGiffen StimsonInRehab
  • francis
    Posts: 11,210
    His insight into the development of doctrine — “that things have to change in order to remain the same, paradoxically, that their expression has to change;”
    IMHO this is suspect
    Thanked by 1tomjaw
  • Chant_Supremacist
    Posts: 267
    I don't know, for a minor example I usually find Church Fathers, early council documents, and medieval theologians difficult to read. The Summa is an exception, as are St. Augustine's works - technically difficult sometimes but remain very 'readable.' I suspect development of doctrine is like active participation in having a perfectly sound meaning that is often given a tendentious twist.
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  • francis
    Posts: 11,210
    Typically (and this occurs in Councils) doctrine is almost always crystallized, not “developed”… huge dif.
    Thanked by 1tomjaw
  • monasteryliturgistmonasteryliturgist
    Posts: 520
    do you know what the rest of the context is from that quotation?
  • Andrew_Malton
    Posts: 1,237
    Newman wrote, famously, “In time it [a great idea] enters upon strange territory; points of controversy alter their bearing; parties rise and around [the idea]; dangers and hopes appear in new relations; and old principles reappear under new forms. It changes with them in order to remain the same. In a higher world it is otherwise, but here below to live is to change, and to be perfect is to have changed often.”

    Here below, that's important.

    I do not believe, and cannot find, that St John Henry wrote “their expression has to change”. I think he would be more careful. But if he did, I’d like to see the context too.

    In the larger passage (from Development of Doctrine) the point is that ideas mature, become more themselves in engagement with the changing territory around them, and that “the stream is clearest near the spring” is not really appropriate for the developed idea.
    Thanked by 2monasteryliturgist M. Jackson Osborn
  • Liam
    Posts: 5,502
    ML

    It's a statement by Fr Ignatius Harrison C.O. from an interview by NCR published late last month:

    https://www.ncregister.com/news/pentin-newman-doctor-providential
  • IanWIanW
    Posts: 795
    @Francis
    Typically (and this occurs in Councils) doctrine is almost always crystallized, not “developed”… huge dif.
    .

    That's rather the point. Doctrine doesn't magically come out of nowhere: authority recognises our developing understanding of unchanging truth.
    Thanked by 1StimsonInRehab
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