Baltimore:

The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops voted almost unanimously in support of declaring St. John Henry Newman a 'doctor of the church.' The Committee on Doctrine of the US bishops asked the prelates if they agreed with a petition filed by the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of England and Wales requesting the Vatican to declare Newman a doctor of the Church at their annual fall general assembly in Baltimore on November 15.

With just two bishops voting ‘no’, the American prelates decided to send a letter to Pope Francis conveying their support for the UK Bishops’ proposal. Several American bishops, including Bishop Robert Barron of Winona-Rochester, Minnesota, spoke vehemently in favor of a proposal to choose the English cardinal as a doctor of the Church. “If that happens, that Newman is named a doctor, we should take advantage of that, and study his writings deeply. I think it might help to heal some of the divisions in our Church,” said Bishop Barron.

Bishop Daniel Flores, Chairman of the Committee on Doctrine, brought forth the proposal, which was voted in favor by 240 bishops. Bishop Flores said the Committee on Doctrine considered a request by the English Bishops “and concluded that the writings of St. John Henry Newman are truly eminent and of great relevance for the church today, especially in the areas of the development of doctrine, the moral foundations of education, the primacy of conscience, the role of the laity and the search for the truth, amongst many others.”

The 19th-century British Cardinal was born in 1801 and was a convert to the Catholic faith from Anglicanism. He encountered hostility and discrimination from both his family and community as a result of his decision to become a Catholic. He was ordained an Anglican priest in 1825 and later founded the Oxford Movement, which established the Catholic roots of Anglicanism.

Later, in 1847, he was ordained as a Catholic priest and established the Oratory of St. Philip Neri in England. Having founded the Catholic University of Ireland and two schools for boys, he was especially committed to education. ‘Idea of a University’ by Newman became a crucial work in Catholic higher education. A poet and theologian, he passed away in 1890 in Birmingham. His petition for sainthood was launched in 1958, and in 2010, he was beatified by Pope Benedict XVI. On October 13, 2019, Cardinal Newman was canonized by Pope Francis.