By apologetics one generally means the kind of intellectual apologetics that we find in Newman’s Development of Christian Doctrine, Apologia, and Grammar of Assent. But Newman was also the persuasive apologist of the imagination, particularly in his two novels and Difficulties of Anglicans and Present Position of Catholics. In Loss and Gain Newman takes his readers into a Catholic church to experience the reality of Catholic worship, an imaginative experience designed to impress upon their imagination the difference between a real (...) and an unreal religion. In Difficulties of Anglicans he warns Anglo-Catholics against the misuse of the imagination when unguided by the reason. But the misuse does not take away the use, and he explains how important a part imagination had played in his own conversion to Rome. The analogies he presses on the imaginations of his Anglo-Catholic readers are nothing to the analogies he piles up in Present Position of Catholics, where the most vivid imagery in all his writings is to be found, as he employs shock tactics in his attempt to delete the anti-Catholic stain on the English Protestant imagination. And finally in Callista, Newman practically abandons his most famous apologetic argument from conscience for the existence of God in favour of a direct appeal to the imagination of the heroine, to her need for liberation from self-imprisonment, a liberation that she can only find in the image of an incarnate God. (shrink)

Newman’s English empiricist background had alienated him from neoscholastic and analytic philosophers. His theological concerns separated him fromother empiricists, while his empiricism separated him from idealist philosophers who gave serious consideration to religious ideas. It is only recently that Newman has begun to be taken seriously as a philosopher as well as a theologian. We can now see that Newman identifies epistemological problems and offers solutions that are philosophically relevant today. In the words of Basil Mitchell, Newman was original because (...) he demanded “a much more subtle appreciation of the way reason works, not only in relation to religious truth, but also in respect to all matter of serious importance,” including the philosophy of science. For Newman realized that science and philosophy are like religious faith in that none of these branches of knowledge is ‘rational’ in the traditional Lockean sense, and thus none can appeal to a neutral, objective standard of rationality. Since he rejects foundationalism, the problem for Newman (as for Plantinga) is how to judge between differing systems of belief. Newman’s resolution, in Mitchell’s words, lay in the recognition that “a rational resolution of disputes between rival traditions does not depend on... a neutral standpoint.” Instead, one can always re-examine and revise one’s first principles or antecedent assumptions in light of one’s evolving understanding and appeal to tradition. All branches of knowledge, not only religious convictions, require one to refine one’s judgment in this manner. (shrink)

Newman’s English empiricist background had alienated him from neoscholastic and analytic philosophers. His theological concerns separated him fromother empiricists, while his empiricism separated him from idealist philosophers who gave serious consideration to religious ideas. It is only recently that Newman has begun to be taken seriously as a philosopher as well as a theologian. We can now see that Newman identifies epistemological problems and offers solutions that are philosophically relevant today. In the words of Basil Mitchell, Newman was original because (...) he demanded “a much more subtle appreciation of the way reason works, not only in relation to religious truth, but also in respect to all matter of serious importance,” including the philosophy of science. For Newman realized that science and philosophy are like religious faith in that none of these branches of knowledge is ‘rational’ in the traditional Lockean sense, and thus none can appeal to a neutral, objective standard of rationality. Since he rejects foundationalism, the problem for Newman (as for Plantinga) is how to judge between differing systems of belief. Newman’s resolution, in Mitchell’s words, lay in the recognition that “a rational resolution of disputes between rival traditions does not depend on... a neutral standpoint.” Instead, one can always re-examine and revise one’s first principles or antecedent assumptions in light of one’s evolving understanding and appeal to tradition. All branches of knowledge, not only religious convictions, require one to refine one’s judgment in this manner. (shrink)

John Henry Newman was a major figure in nineteenth-century religious history. He was one of the major protagonists of the Oxford or Tractarian Movement within the Church of England whose influence continues to be felt within Anglicanism. A high-profile convert to Catholicism, he was an important commentator on Vatican I and is often called 'the Father' of the Second Vatican Council. Newman's thinking highlights and anticipates the central themes of modern theology including hermeneutics, the importance of historical-critical research, the relationship (...) between theology and literature, and the reinterpretation of the nature of faith. His work is characterised by two elements that have come especially to the fore in post-modern theology, namely, the importance of the religious imagination and the fiduciary character of all knowledge. This Companion fills a need for an accessible, comprehensive and systematic presentation of the major themes in Newman's work. (shrink)

The English writers of Dr Coulson’s ‘Common Tradition’ all subscribe to a ‘fiduciary’ as opposed to ‘analytic’ use of language. For Coleridge, unlike Bentham, ‘a language is for action as well as reflection: it must be responded to in all its richness and diversity before we can know what some of its words mean’. A fiduciary language ‘reveals not only the traditions and living principles of a people, but the world of ideas by which all men live’. Coulson argues that (...) the key Coleridgean word ‘idea’ is ‘most clearly understood when it is seen as originating in an understanding of the Church as sacramentally…the presence of Christ in the world’. ‘Such a sacramental conception of the Church is at the heart not only of the Oxford Movement and of Newman’s idea of the Church, but also of that other movement which derives even more directly from Coleridge and is associated with F D Maurice’. But unlike Coleridge and Maurice, for Newman the idea of the Church Catholic must correspond to ‘a tangible, visible, and identifiable empirical entity’, which is not its particular manifestation in the National Church. On the other hand, Coleridge’s ideal of a ‘clerisy’ corresponds to Newman’s insistence on the importance of an educated laity to represent the Church in society; and if Newman could not accept that the idea of the Church is ‘regulated’ by the Nation, nevertheless it is the laity which is the ‘measure’ of his ‘regulating principles’—theology. Where Newman differed so sharply from both Coleridge and Maurice was in his insistence on first asking the Benthamite question, ‘how do we know that Christianity is true?’ before exploring the meaning or relevance of Christian doctrines and institutions. Coulson concludes by claiming that Newman’s final vision of a Church which ‘cannot be conceived sacramentally, and in its idea, in isolation from society’ both supplements Vatican I and anticipates Vatican II, as well as summing up the essential insight of Coleridge and Maurice. (shrink)

The English writers of Dr Coulson’s ‘Common Tradition’ all subscribe to a ‘fiduciary’ as opposed to ‘analytic’ use of language. For Coleridge, unlike Bentham, ‘a language is for action as well as reflection: it must be responded to in all its richness and diversity before we can know what some of its words mean’. A fiduciary language ‘reveals not only the traditions and living principles of a people, but the world of ideas by which all men live’. Coulson argues that (...) the key Coleridgean word ‘idea’ is ‘most clearly understood when it is seen as originating in an understanding of the Church as sacramentally…the presence of Christ in the world’. ‘Such a sacramental conception of the Church is at the heart not only of the Oxford Movement and of Newman’s idea of the Church, but also of that other movement which derives even more directly from Coleridge and is associated with F D Maurice’. But unlike Coleridge and Maurice, for Newman the idea of the Church Catholic must correspond to ‘a tangible, visible, and identifiable empirical entity’, which is not its particular manifestation in the National Church. On the other hand, Coleridge’s ideal of a ‘clerisy’ corresponds to Newman’s insistence on the importance of an educated laity to represent the Church in society; and if Newman could not accept that the idea of the Church is ‘regulated’ by the Nation, nevertheless it is the laity which is the ‘measure’ of his ‘regulating principles’—theology. Where Newman differed so sharply from both Coleridge and Maurice was in his insistence on first asking the Benthamite question, ‘how do we know that Christianity is true?’ before exploring the meaning or relevance of Christian doctrines and institutions. Coulson concludes by claiming that Newman’s final vision of a Church which ‘cannot be conceived sacramentally, and in its idea, in isolation from society’ both supplements Vatican I and anticipates Vatican II, as well as summing up the essential insight of Coleridge and Maurice. (shrink)