Pope Leo XIV elevated St. John Henry Newman to one of the Catholic Church’s most prestigious distinctions on Saturday, naming him a doctor of the church. This honor highlights Newman’s significant impact as a 19th-century British convert and theologian, positioning him as an exemplar for Catholic educators.

Newman now joins an exclusive group, being only the 38th individual in the Church’s 2,000-year history to receive the title of “doctor.” His name stands alongside revered Christian figures such as St. Augustine, St. Therese of Lisieux, and St. John of the Cross.

This distinction acknowledges Newman’s universal resonance and his profound contributions to deepening the understanding of the Christian faith, appealing to both Anglican and Catholic communities.

A theologian and poet originally from the Church of England, Newman is celebrated for his writings and sermons on the development of doctrine, the pursuit of truth, and the essence of a university. His decision to convert to Catholicism in 1845, driven by personal conviction, has earned him respect from both conservative and progressive circles.

During a special Holy Year Mass dedicated to Catholic teachers and students, Pope Leo not only conferred the title of doctor on Newman but also named him a co-patron of Catholic education, sharing this role with St. Thomas Aquinas.

It was particularly fitting: It was Leo’s namesake, Pope Leo XIII, who made Newman a Catholic cardinal after his conversion, and it was the earlier Leo who declared Aquinas a doctor of the church and patron of Catholic education.

A model for educators

Leo’s decision to hold out Newman as a model for Catholic educators suggests that Catholic teaching will be a priority for him going forward, especially as he emphasizes the ethical use of artificial intelligence for future generations.

Earlier this week, Leo penned a new document that cited Newman in his call for Catholic schools to be places for spiritual growth and community, and where the use of technology always keeps human dignity front and center.

In his homily, Leo quoted from Newman’s most famous text, the beloved British hymn “Lead, Kindly Light,” to urge that Catholic educators “shine like stars in the world” in the collective search for truth.

“The task of education is precisely to offer this Kindly Light to those who might otherwise remain imprisoned by the particularly insidious shadows of pessimism and fear,” he said. “We are called to form people, so that they may shine like stars in their full dignity.”

The Catholic Church is one of the world’s leading players in education, operating more than 225,000 primary and secondary schools and enrolling some 2.5 million students at Catholic universities around the globe, according to Vatican statistics.

Leo was educated by the Augustinians, taught math and physics, and is a member of the Augustinian religious order, which places a special emphasis on St. Augustine’s search for truth and the command “Tolle, lege,” which translates from Latin as “Take up and read.”

A model for the information age

The Rev. George Bowen, the postulator who oversaw Newman’s canonization and designation as a doctor, said Newman too was confronted with the 19th-century equivalent of the information age, when cheap periodicals were readily available and reading rates shot up. Newman insisted on the need for a wholistic liberal education that included Catholic theology, but also focused on students and teachers interacting in a relational way in the quest for truth and knowledge, he said.

“Suddenly, the world was swimming with information,” Bowen told reporters. “So Newman’s ways of coping with this huge ocean of knowledge and making sense of it, having a connected view, is something very, very relevant today.”

When Newman defected from the Church of England to the Catholic Church in 1845, he lost friends, work and even family ties, believing the truth he was searching for could only be found in the Catholic faith.

Cherished by both Anglicans and Catholics

And yet even today, Newman remains beloved in the Church of England. His hymns were sung last week in the Sistine Chapel when King Charles III prayed alongside Leo in the historic ecumenical service.

Several important Anglican leaders wrote to the Vatican, supporting his designation as a church doctor, and the Anglican archbishop of York was invited to participate in Saturday’s service. It featured the hymn, “Lead, Kindly Light,” which remains a fixture of Anglican services.

“Newman is a big ecumenical figure in the sense that he owes his faith to his upbringing in the Church of England,” Bowen said.

Paul Shrimpton, a leading Newman scholar at Magdalen College, Oxford, said it was significant that each of the last popes had promoted Newman in his remarkably quick path to being declared a doctor of the church, underlining his universal appeal to progressive and liberals alike.

St. John Paul II declared him venerable in 1991, in the first step to possible sainthood; Pope Benedict XVI beatified him during a 2010 visit to Birmingham, England; Pope Francis canonized him in 2019 with Charles in the audience, and now Leo declared him a church doctor.

“I think that speaks volumes,” said Shrimpton, who contributed an essay on Newman’s influence on Catholic education for the official Vatican dossier, or “positio” that made the case for him to be declared a doctor. “All very different popes show that he is part of the universal teaching of church.”

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