8th Sunday After Pentecost (2025)

Sermon of Father John A. Perricone on the 8th Sunday After Pentecost given Sunday, August 3rd, 2025 at Our Lady of Sorrows Church, Jersey City, New Jersey. Father reflects on how St. John Henry Newman was made a Doctor of the Church for defending doctrinal truth, rejecting religious liberalism, and embracing the painful sacrifices required by fidelity to Christ. Media courtesy of Cantantes In Cordibus. Please like the video, subscribe to the channel, and share with your Catholic Friends!

In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost, Amen.

In the late morning of this past Thursday, the Prefect of the Sacred Dicastry for the Causes of the Saints, Cardinal Marcelo Semeraro, was admitted into the presence of the Holy Father for an audience. He was presenting to His Holiness a document for which he was requesting his signature. And after the Sovereign Pontiff affixed his signature to the document in the presence of the Cardinal Prefect, Saint John Henry Newman was created a Doctor of the Catholic Church.

But what is a Doctor of the Catholic Church? Of the thousands and thousands of saints on the Roman calendar, only 37 of those saints have been declared Doctors by the Catholic Church. In order to help us understand the meaning of a Doctor of the Church, it might be helpful to explore the word “Doctor.” It is derived from the Latin verb doceo, which means “to teach.” We have a hint, therefore, that a Doctor is an expert teacher in a particular subject.

In order for a saint to be elevated to the grand title of Doctor, he must have three characteristics. First of all, a distinct and overwhelming sanctity. Second, the saint must be possessed of great learning. And thirdly, the saint ultimately must receive the approbation of the Roman Pontiff. A Doctor of the Church is sought upon by the Church's Magisterium for a deeper and more profound understanding of the mysteries of our Holy Catholic Faith. Indeed, it is with the help of the writings of the Doctors of the Church that the Magisterium ultimately will declare certain truths of the Revelation to be infallible.

John Henry Newman is now a Doctor of the Church. There are three aspects of his life in the brief span of time we have this morning to consider. The first two has to do with why Mother Church, amongst many reasons, has declared him a Doctor.

John Henry Newman lived in the middle of the 19th century in Great Britain and was an Anglican priest. He ultimately made his way as a convert into the Catholic Church, whereupon he wrote voluminously about the Church and its mysteries. Of all of them, we should take note of two.

Number one: Saint John Henry Newman spoke about what the Church has called the proper development of doctrine. Put in a way that we can understand, Our Lord Jesus Christ entrusted to the Apostles His Revelation. And that Revelation, because it was entrusted to them by Him to the Apostles was perfect and complete in every way. However, the intellect of man is not perfect and complete in every way. And therefore, it will require centuries of Mother Church pouring over these mysteries with the help of her Doctors to draw from them deeper and more profound meaning in order for us to attain Heaven.

Very much like a flower, the development of doctrine begins with the seed—the Revelation Our Lord entrusted to the Apostles—and then it grows and grows and grows, never ceasing to be what it is, but with the passage of time manifesting the richness and beauty of what it is, never ceasing to be itself.

Why is this so important? Because not only in the time of Saint John Henry Newman, but especially in our time, there have been certain voices that wanted to twist this doctrine of development and make it mean something exactly the opposite of what Mother Church always meant it to mean. The enemies of the Church—within the Church itself—were claiming that the development of doctrine means that the teaching of the Church changes in order to accommodate the whims and the passing fads of each and every culture. That, my friends, is heresy. That, my friends, is in complete contradiction to the Church's inspired understanding of the development of doctrine.

The second aspect of John Henry Newman's life that we should consider: from the time he was an Anglican priest and until his death, he recognized that the most perfidious enemy of our Holy Religion is what the good saint called “liberalism.” 

What did he mean by liberalism? He meant this idea that was in the air already in the mid-19th century—and now all about us—that every religion is equal, that no religion is better than any other, including our own.

On the eve of receiving the red hat from Pope Leo XIII, our now Doctor Saint John Henry Newman made a very famous speech. It is called the Biglietto Speech. Let me just read to you what he said—just a little segment of what he said in that speech: “Liberalism,” the Doctor wrote, “in religion is the doctrine that there is no positive truth in religion, but, that one creed is as good as another. And this is the teaching which has gained substance and force daily. It is inconsistent with—of any religion as true. It teaches that all religions are to be tolerated, for all religions are simply a matter of opinion.”

He concludes: “Liberalism in religion teaches that religion is merely a feeling, a taste, a sentiment—not a truth, not miraculous—and it is the right of each and every man to choose religion in whatever way strikes his fancy.”

But I think the final part of John Henry Newman's life will touch our hearts most deeply. John Henry Newman had achieved great prominence in the Anglican Church, respected by all Anglo-Catholics in the middle of the 19th century. He was, after all, one of the greatest English prose stylists of 100 years. Then he decides to abandon that heretical religion and to embrace the Catholic Faith. It cost him dearly. He not only lost all his dearest Anglican friends, but they turned against him viciously. Even members of his family disowned him. He no longer had the advantage of having a church at Oxford University and a very handsome dwelling. Everything was taken away from him. He suffered greatly, especially at the loss of his friends. 

He writes in one of his letters: “I am now going to those whom I do not know and of whom I expect very little. I am making myself to the Anglicans an outcast—and that at my age. Yet I embrace a sacrifice in which I feel no pleasure. Oh, how forlorn, and dreary has been my life ever since I have become a Catholic. At times, it seems like nothing but failure.”

This very sensitive scholar, saint, and Doctor suffered dearly until the end of his life at the end of the 19th century—hated by the Anglicans who once loved him, and distrusted by the new Catholics of whom he was now a member.

Sometimes we are called to make that kind of sacrifice—the one that Saint John Henry Newman made. Sometimes it requires of us to distance ourselves from some of our fellow Catholics who no longer believe in the truths of the Catholic Church as we do. That separation will probably be the greatest suffering of our lives. But it will be the greatest test of our lives. But we will not leave those whom we love, not because we no longer love them, but because we love our Blessed Savior even more.

God bless you.