The Discourses Addressed to Mixed Congregations were delivered by Newman after his arrival in Birmingham as head of the Oratory in 1849. They examine Catholicism from the inside and deal with the popular prejudices which contemporaries entertained of it. In these eighteen Discourses we can see the same touch which Newman displayed in the pulpit of St. Mary's now used to explain the truths of the faith which he had embraced.

John Henry Newman, (1801-1890) was a Roman Catholic priest and cardinal, a convert from Anglicanism in October 1845. In his early life, he was a major figure in the Oxford Movement to bring the Church of England back to its Catholic roots. Eventually his studies in history persuaded him to become a Roman Catholic. Both before and after becoming a Roman Catholic, he wrote influential books, including Via Media, Essay on the Development of Christian Doctrine (1845), Apologia Pro Vita Sua (1865-66) and the Grammar of Assent (1870). He was beatified by Pope Benedict XVI in 2010.