In Newman's Name
January 20, 1926 THE COMMONWEAL 287 IN NEWMAN'S NAME HERE is a classical firmness in the maxim which Dr. Nicholas Murray Butler, addressing the seventh annual Newman club convention,...
...We see at once a momentous benefit which the philosopher is likely to confer on the pastors of the Church...
...It is well to add that the gain has not been merely quantitative...
...It is now practicable to invite the members to participate in tasks which extend beyond the boundaries of college life, and so prepare for leadership in the performance of civic obligations...
...This year, for instance, the Very Reverend William J. Duane, president of Fordham University, stressed the duty to "let others see that Christ is still living"—that the Divinity of the Redeemer is the central fact of destiny, culture, and government...
...The total enrolment in these clubs is not enough...
...Likewise, the number of Catholics who complete courses in the public high schools is constantly increasing...
...For the words of the great Cardinal whose name the movement has chosen as its title, have an immemorial cogency...
...But the staggering proportions assumed by this comparatively new problem of education may well have their weight with us...
...The Bureau of Education of the National Catholic Welfare Conference has compiled statistics which indicate that over 55 percent of those graduating from Catholic high schools seek additional university and college training...
...We believe that almost every secular educational institution of consequence realizes this fact, and is ready to offer the Newman clubs a cordial welcome...
...Crowds are in themselves impressive, but crowds stirred by principle cannot be resisted...
...This is certainly not an ideal situation, but certain circumstances indicate that it is likely to be a permanent one...
...When the idea of unifying Catholic students attending secular institutions of learning was first entertained, theoretic and practical difficulties seemed to bar the road to success...
...and obviously, the zeal and patience of many chaplains will earn still greater rewards...
...If it becomes steadily more obvious that religious conviction and moral rectitude are priceless gifts which the Church can make to American life, then certainly even the civic conscience urges that everything humanly possible be done to make the seed-time of education a period of spiritual growth, not of decay and drought...
...Nicholas Murray Butler, addressing the seventh annual Newman club convention, proposed for meditation—"Against the intolerances of barbarism, those of us who care for the intellectual life, for the things of the spirit, must teach, preach, and exemplify tolerance...
...Naturally, the Catholic views the problem in its higher and more intimate aspects as well—knowing that in the household there is, as nowhere else, the bliss of obedience and the glory of peace...
...But, perhaps, the brightest moment in the convention's story was when the Reverend J. Elliot Ross, the presiding chaplain, announced that one suggestion of importance already had been acted upon—that "there are about seventy volunteer teachers from Newman clubs" to perform the task of giving religious instruction to Catholic pupils of the public schools of New York City...
...Whatever may be the response of the future, it seems clear that we must achieve the hearty cooperation of all our educational agencies, and support loyally, frankly, and intelligently whatever wise authority terms worthy of support...
...And we must suppose that a man like Newman would be deeply thrilled by the spectacle of a vast throng of young men and women who, while being educated in the arts and the lore of professions, have organized themselves into a strong body for the sake of Catholic faith...
...Limitations and needs are obvious on all sides...
...One comes away from a convention sponsored and conducted by these young people, with new admiration for their steadfastness, their seemingly disciplined cooperation, their readiness to display a sacred flag...
...Is there any way in which they can be disposed of effectively...
...These first fruits show clearly that the hopes which underlay the founding of the Newman movement were not illusory...
...What shall be done with this bright and bustling multitude...
...Tyranny often has been very harsh and vindictive, but there is no brutality like the cruelty of ignorance—ignorance especially in the sense which was so often the theme of Cardinal Newman's thoughts— ignorance of psychology, which assumes that highly differentiated human natures, the products of old and complex environments, can be made to fit one mould or formula...
...The existing thirty-eight Newman club groups are not enough...
...To be able to break through the meshes of that thraldom, and to disentangle and disengage its ten thousand holds upon the heart, is to bring it, I might almost say, half way to Heaven...
...January 20, 1926 THE COMMONWEAL 287 IN NEWMAN'S NAME HERE is a classical firmness in the maxim which Dr...
...Recent surveys indicate that the number of Catholic students attending secular colleges is about forty thousand, and larger than the total attendance at Catholic seats of higher learning...
...Michael Gavin, speaking as president of the New York Archdiocesan Council of Catholic Women, emphasized various ways in which Newmanites might join in social work...
...It is obvious that the first step which they have to effect in the conversion of man and the renovation of his nature, is his rescue from that fearful subjection to sense which is his ordinary state...
...But if good work has been done, it is still more essential that good work should go on being done...
...And the resources of schools conducted under Catholic auspices are, likewise, not enough...
...There is everything here of which to be proud...
...But year after year the Newman clubs grew in number and strength, so that each annual convention in its turn eclipsed the brilliant achievement of those which had gone before...
Vol. 3 • January 1926 • No. 11
