John Henry Newman: Doctor of the Church / Edited by Philippe Lefebvre & Colin Mason

The thought of John Henry Newman influenced many theologians and church-goers in the twentieth century, and continues to exert an influence today. In his day his was a towering intellect which dominated many of the ecclesiastical disputes of the mid-nineteenth century England. Yet in many ways he was prescient and his work proved to be seminal for key documents of the Second Vatican Council. His writings on the development of doctrine and on conscience proved to be hugely influential and are still the subject of much scholarship today. It is for work such as this that many believe that he will one day be declared a Doctor of the Church.

This book offers an introduction to his thought and teaching, and also provides a more in-depth examination of his most significant contributions to theology. Written by sixteen Newman scholars from around the world, the chapters cover the major topics of Newman on liberalism, faith and reason, the Church, conscience, the laity, and the development of doctrine. 

"With prophetic clarity, Newman discerned the mounting challenges to all forms of religious belief in the Western world. Neither fundamentalist biblicism nor modernistic liberalism, he believe, was a match for the assualts of secularism. But he found a divinely provided remedy in the religion that God had revealed and continued to sustain by His infallible guidance of the Church. The articles in this volume explain how Newman made use of the Catholic tradition to answer his own questions and address the problems of his day. The reader will find good reasons for expecting that Newman will someday be numbered with Athanasius and Chrysostom, Augustine and Aquinas, among the Doctors of the Church." From the foreword by Cardinal Avery Dulles