One of the standard criticisms made of Catholics at the time (c.1840) was that they had added a whole range of things (optional extras or superstitions) to the 'simple teaching of the Gospels'. If this were true then Catholicism was false, and if Catholicism was true then how these developments took place had to be explained. Newman set himself the task of explaining these developments, for if he could not explain them it would be wrong to become a Catholic.

In the months before his conversion he wrote on this question in a book called An Essay on the Development of Christian Doctrine. His explanation was that all that is in the Church's teaching was there from the start, but the whole pattern of what God had revealed was only visible to them after they had fully grasped the key-points of the faith. The more that the Church prayed, studied and lived, the better she was able to understand and communicate what God had done in Jesus Christ. Development for Newman did not mean that new things were added, or that the truth changed, but rather it was like the development of a photograph. Once the photo is taken everything in the photograph is already there, but as it is developed, different things become more visible, clearer, and things are seen in contrasts as well as in their similarities. Later, someone can come with a magnifying glass and see more detail again. In the same way the teaching of the Church develops.

From the start people believed in Christ and that in the events of His birth, life, death and resurrection we are given new life. Over centuries, the Church learned how best to say who Christ is. In the process it clarified the importance of Our Lady. This in turn led to a richer understanding of grace, and so on. The Church is always deepening its understanding; seeing new ways that God is active in His world.

Today we cannot appreciate the stigma that used to be attached to joining the Catholic Church. For Newman himself, the total loss of prestige and respectability meant little. What he did miss were the friends, even relatives, who would no longer have anything but disgust for him. His letters record his sorrow; his one consolation was that he could be in the presence of Christ in the Blessed Sacrament. He was now in middle-age and quite literally was starting from scratch.

The following spring the group moved from Littlemore to a house provided by Bishop Wiseman near his seminary at Oscott. Newman named the house 'Maryvale' after the Blessed Virgin. There it was decided, in consultation with Wiseman, that the group would stay together and join a religious order. Wiseman felt (as did Newman himself) that the most urgent task of the day was to cope with the rising tide of atheism, and he believed that Newman was uniquely equipped for the task. In September 1846, Newman and some others left to study for the priesthood in Rome. There the group not only got ready for ordination, but had to settle on which religious order join. They thought of the Jesuits or the Oratorians, and settled on the latter. Pope Pius IX took a personal interest in Newman and the whole enterprise, so things proceeded at speed, Newman was ordained on Trinity Sunday 1847 (30 May), said his first Mass on Corpus Christi, and by 6 December had all his plans made for the Congregation of the Oratory in England and was ready to leave for home. They went by land, stopping at Loretto to place their future work under Mary's protection, and arrived in England on Christmas Eve.

In all the letters Newman wrote at this time there is one theme: the joy of being a Catholic - every day he found out some new fact or practice or detail of the Church and rejoiced over it.

All through his life Newman was struck by how easy it would be not to believe in God with certainty, i.e., to replace faith with a statement like: 'there might be a God, or again there might not be, so really the whole thing is beyond us and religion is just opinions and feelings'.

To tackle this growing unbelief had been his aim in the University Sermons (1826-43). On many occasions he had hoped to return and write at length on the question. But whilst he had touched on it, for instance in the Dublin lectures, he never had the opportunity to do much about it. In 1866, while on holiday at Glion in Switzerland, thoughts came to him that unlocked many problems and he began work in earnest on a book that would show how reasonable it is to have faith even though God is greater than anything we could see or touch. In it he showed how someone can honestly believe in God, and have genuine certainty, without having gone through a whole host of investigations to see if God's existence could be proved. The human can know and confront reality, even though not everyone could, then go and describe logically on paper what they are doing.

He wrote up his theory of belief in a book called The Grammar of Assent, which appeared in March 1870. It is the most difficult of his writings, but perhaps it will have the longest influence.

In February 1879 Pius IX died. Newman loved him deeply; obeyed him utterly, but held that in certain practical matters other measures would yield better results. The new Pope, Leo XIII, who had himself been 'under a cloud', albeit a smaller cloud than Newman's, promised fresh approaches. The possibility of Newman receiving some token of recognition for his work was mooted. The Duke of Norfolk mentioned the possibility of his being made a cardinal. The idea was conveyed to Leo by Cardinal Manning who endorsed the idea. The Pope liked the suggestion, so enquiries were made as to whether Newman would accept. Leo wanted to give him the Red Hat as a testimony to his virtues and learning. Newman was delighted to receive it as a total vindication and endorsement of his work to establish a new defence of faith. Only one problem remained: at that time cardinals who were not bishops usually lived in Rome. Newman felt he was too old to move; could he remain in Birmingham? Leo agreed.

It was announced on 15 March 1879, and the Red Hat was given to him in Rome on
12 May. At the ceremony Newman gave a now famous speech in which he outlined
certain themes which had been his constant concern from his earliest days in Oxford:

'And I rejoice to say to one great mischief I have from the first opposed myself.
For thirty, forty, fifty years I have resisted to the best of my powers the spirit of
Liberalism in religion. That is, the doctrine that there is no positive truth in
religion, but that one creed is as good as another.... It is inconsistent with any
recognition of any religion, as true.’

That conviction, that pursuit of truth had led him from being a Calvinist who hated all that Rome stood for, to the point when he stood in a scarlet cardinal's soutane in Rome itself.

On many specific points of the faith Newman has left us an important legacy. I would mention three. First, his stress on the fact that our faith is revealed by God and not some human construction. Second, the importance of the Church: Christians are not just a group with shared beliefs, but a visible body on earth gathered by the Holy Spirit into a unity. Third, the importance of working for Christian unity and he has left many hints about how problems and misunderstandings can be overcome.

With thanks to and acknowledgements for the extract from:

'Cardinal Newman - Seeker of Truth' by Thomas O'Loughlin

Published in 1988 by
Veritas Publications
7­8 Lower Abbey Street
Dublin 1
Ireland

We would like to thank Veritas Publications for permission to reprint this extract from:  ‘Cardinal Newman - Seeker of Truth by Thomas O’Loughlin, published in 1988.