Victorian Churches and Churchmen: Essays Presented to Vincent Alan McClelland, ed. by Sheridan Gilley

Abstract

93 that “the ruler decides all things” (197). Yet he notes that Bishop Gasser held that papal authority is not absolute (197), and Perrone argued that the acts of the Pope are null if they tend to the destruction of the Church (198). The Pope,then,is not an absolute ruler with unlimited authority. Some of the papalists also acknowledged that even the Pope cannot propose new revelation,create new sacraments,or discard any of the existing sacraments (193). Neither Vatican I nor Vatican II used the adjective “absolute” to describe papal power. The Pope’s authority is limited by divine and natural law and by previous dogmatic teachings of the faith. Readers interested in the thought of John Henry Newman will find Costigan’s book most rewarding. It treats the formation and the development of doctrine which were major themes in Newman’s work. One significant mention of Newman is found in the chapter on Perrone (167). Newman, shortly after his conversion to Catholicism, asked Perrone to review an article he wrote in Latin entitled,“On the Development of Catholic Dogma.” Newman was pleased with Perrone’s comments and appreciated the help he later received from him when he faced difficulties in Rome. Costigan’s book is highly recommended. Although it deals with a technical subject, it is written clearly and is extremely well organized. Anyone interested in ecclesiological,historical,or ecumenical questions will learn a lot from this book. The extensive bibliography and index add to its value. Patrick Granfield O.S.B. The Catholic University of America,Washington, DC Victorian Churches and Churchmen: Essays Presented to Vincent Alan McClelland, edited by Sheridan Gilley. Published for the Catholic Record Society. Woodbridge, Suffolk, United Kingdom: Boydell, 2005. Pages: xvii+387. Cloth, $80.00, ISBN 0– 9028322–2–0. Victorian Churches and Churchmen is a collection of sixteen essays that provide a tribute to Dr. Vincent Alan McClelland. For those who are new to the subject of Victorian religion, McClelland is perhaps the most prolific author on the subject, especially Catholic education at every level. This volume lists five pages of his essays and books. The contributors to this volume are well-known in their respective circles, but the focus of this work is probably education and pastoral matters. Professor Gilley’s “Introduction” is a glowing tribute to McClelland’s work and influence (a great number of dissertations). The editor might be a bit too kind in his treatment of persons who had spent a fair amount of their lives attacking Cardinal Newman. At the top of that list is Dr.Thomas Arnold (1795–1842), Headmaster of Rugby School, who surpassed even Cardinal Manning, in his slander. The late David Newsome (1929–2004) invented the phrase “Newmania” in his commentary on MeriolTrevor’s life of Newman (1962) and the phrase has been used by persons who could not shine Newman’s shoes, but serves as a put-down for those who admire Newman and Trevor’s book. The Newsome essay is largely a review of Stanley’s Life BOOK REVIEW NEWMAN STUDIES JOURNAL 94 of Arnold, and it says little about the endless attacks on Newman that Arnold seems to have taken as his mission in life. It is little wonder that Charles Kingsley admired Arnold as he did. The essay on modern Scottish Catholicism by Bernard Aspinwall is clogged with learning but its content was a delightful surprise. The Scottish apparently did not agree with each other, except for their loyalty to the church. When I was a student at the university in Edinburgh, the novel Maria Monk (1836) was commonly displayed in the booksellers’ windows and a fellow parishioner told me that the Catholics had suffered much during his lifetime. For those who don’t know, Maria Monk was a novel that “depicted” life in a convent. No detail was too absurd not to be believed by theVictorian reader and it was just one in a series of such novels. One point, the work of Fr. Hadley ought to have been expanded upon since it is a wonderful description of life for the Irish immigrants in Scotland in the nineteenth century. Rene Kollar’s essay on Sister Barbara...