John Henry Newman
John Henry Newman Other names "Dr. Newman", "Cardinal Newman" Era 19th-century philosophy Region Western Philosophy School Aristotelianism Empiricism Personalism Main interests Faith and rationality Religious epistemology Historical Theology Christian apologetics Philosophy of education Liberal education Notable ideas The Development of doctrine The Illative sense Influences Aristotle, Cicero, Clement of Alexandria, Origen, Athanasius, Basil of Caesarea, Hume, Locke, Butler, Richard Whately Influenced Matthew Arnold, Gerard Manley Hopkins, Bernard Lonergan, Benedict XVI, Alasdair MacIntyre, Jaroslav Pelikan, Linda Zagzebski, G.K. Chesterton, C.S. Lewis, Ronald Knox Blessed John Henry Newman CO (21 February 1801 – 11 August 1890), also referred to as Cardinal Newman, was an important figure in the religious history of England in the 19th century. He was known nationally by the mid-1830s. Originally an evangelical Oxford academic and priest in the Church of England, Newman was a leader in the Oxford Movement. This influential grouping of Anglicans wished to return the Church of England to many Catholic beliefs and forms of worship traditional in the medieval times to restore ritual expression. In 1845 Newman left the Church of England and was received into the Catholic Church. In 1879, he was created cardinal by Pope Leo XIII in recognition of his services to the cause of religion in England. Hitherto, in modern times, no simple priest, without duties in the Roman Curia, had been raised to the Sacred College. Newman’s elevation was hailed by the English nation and by Catholics everywhere with unexampled enthusiasm. It broke down the wall of partition between the See of Rome and England. He was instrumental in the founding of the Catholic University of Ireland, which evolved into University College, Dublin, today the largest university in Ireland. Newman's beatification was officially proclaimed by Pope Benedict XVI on 19 September 2010 during his visit to the United Kingdom. His canonisation is dependent on the documentation of additional miracles. Newman was also a literary figure of note: his major writings including his autobiography Apologia Pro Vita Sua (1865–66), the Grammar of Assent (1870), and the poem The Dream of Gerontius (1865), which was set to music in 1900 by Edward Elgar. He wrote the popular hymns "Lead, Kindly Light" and "Praise to the Holiest in the Height" (taken from Gerontius).